# Gopalan v. Marsh

Supreme Court of Texas, No. 25-0161

**Gopalan v. Marsh, No. 25-0161 (Tex. May 22, 2026). Holding: As used in Family Code Section 105.002(c), "primary residence" does not refer to a home where the child lives less time than elsewhere, so awarding Marsh more possession contravened the jury's verdict; the Court remanded the possession order and, because it informs the best-interest analysis, the child-support and parental-rights determinations and the appellate attorney's fee award, and otherwise affirmed.**

Practice areas: family law

## Key issues

- In a divorce with joint managing conservators, a parent awarded the exclusive right to designate the children's primary residence cannot be given less possession time than the other parent, because "primary residence" does not mean a home where the child lives less time than elsewhere.
- The Court remanded the possession order, and the child support, parental-rights, and appellate-fee rulings tied to it, but otherwise affirmed.

## Factual History
Andrea Marsh and Prabhakar Gopalan filed for divorce after nine years of marriage; they agreed to joint managing conservatorship of their two children but disputed the allocation of parental rights and the division of the marital estate (Opinion, PDF p. 2).

## Procedural History
After a five-day trial the jury found that Gopalan should have the exclusive right to designate the children's primary residence within Travis County, and the trial court then determined the possession terms, child support, and the remaining parental rights, which the Family Code assigns to the court (Opinion, PDF p. 2). In the decree the court adopted the jury's finding but awarded Marsh greater possession (about 57% of the time), monthly child support, most of the exclusive parental rights, and conditional appellate attorney's fees (Opinion, PDF p. 2). A divided Third Court of Appeals (Austin) affirmed, concluding that the decree "implements the letter of the jury's verdict," and acknowledged a split among the courts of appeals (Opinion, PDF p. 3). The vehicle in this Court is a petition for review filed by Gopalan, argued March 4, 2026, and decided May 22, 2026 (Opinion, PDF pp. 1, 3, 18).

## Issues Presented
Gopalan presents four issues (Petition for Review (Petitioner), PDF p. 10):
1. Whether the possession schedule contravenes the jury's verdict in violation of the Texas Constitution and Family Code.
2. Whether the allocation of parental rights contravenes the verdict and infringes on his fundamental parental liberties.
3. Whether the $250,000 bond for international travel with the children violates due process and equal protection.
4. Whether the child support order contradicts the jury's determination of primary residence.

The Court framed the central issue as whether the possession order contravened the jury verdict, and separately addressed his other challenges and the attorney's fee award (Opinion, PDF pp. 1, 14-15).

## Standard(s) of Review
What "primary residence" means in Family Code Section 105.002(c) is a question of law reviewed de novo, applying a statutory term's common, ordinary meaning unless that yields an absurd result or the context shows a different meaning (Opinion, PDF pp. 9-10).

## Legal Arguments
**Whether the possession order contravenes the jury verdict on primary residence.**

**Gopalan (Petitioner):** The court of appeals' decision renders jury verdicts in custody cases meaningless, because the jury gave him the exclusive right to designate the children's primary residence and the trial court gave him substantially less than the statutory minimum possession for a joint managing conservator, which nullifies the word "primary" (Petition for Review (Petitioner), PDF p. 17). He argues that the parent with the right to determine the primary residence must get to choose where the child lives at least half of the time (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF p. 27).

**Marsh (Respondent):** Gopalan treats the jury's verdict as entitling him to a bundle of additional rights, including child support, decision-making rights, and more possession, but his position is inconsistent with the relevant statutes, he cites no case requiring such an award, and he has not briefed the limited scope of the jury right in family cases or challenged the Code section keeping possession and decision-making rights from the jury (Response to Petition (Respondent), PDF p. 26; Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 24).

**Whether other parts of the decree were error.**

**Gopalan (Petitioner):** The $250,000 bond for international travel violates due process, due course of law, and equal protection, and the allocation of almost all important parental rights to Marsh infringes his fundamental parental liberties (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF p. 8). **Marsh (Respondent):** The bond is not the product of national-origin animus, and Gopalan waived any claim to child support (Response to Petition (Respondent), PDF p. 26).

## Stated Reasons the Court Should Take the Case
Gopalan argued that the courts of appeals are split on whether a trial court may award the other parent more possession than the parent who holds the primary-residence right, and the Court granted review to resolve the split (Petition for Review (Petitioner), PDF p. 17; Opinion, PDF p. 3).

## Oral Argument

- **Meaning of "primary."** Asked for statutory support, Gopalan's counsel cited only five cases giving "primary" its plain meaning, "most important," plus a presumption that the standard possession order is the minimum. (Oral Argument, 0:08:00; 0:11:41)
- **A regular Texan's view.** Asked whether anyone could reasonably say the children's primary residence is with the father under this order, Marsh's counsel said "primary" is clear but "residence" is hard to define. (Oral Argument, 0:37:27; 0:38:00)
- **Share of nights.** On the father's share of nights, Marsh's counsel guessed about 40%; on rebuttal Gopalan's counsel said 43%, adding that the judge eliminated his summer weekend visits. (Oral Argument, 0:26:17; 0:48:31)
- **Scope of remand.** Asked whether, if "primary" is read his way, the Court should send the case back, Gopalan's counsel said the issues are interrelated and reversal would require reversing the related rulings. (Oral Argument, 0:15:05)
- **Effect of a jury finding.** Asked what a jury's primary-residence finding means in practice, Marsh's counsel said it ties that parent to the jury-set area; changing it requires a material and substantial change. (Oral Argument, 0:31:45)
- **Parents' agreement.** Justice Bland asked whether parents violate a constitutional principle by agreeing that one has primary residence but less possession time; Gopalan's counsel said parents may agree to such arrangements. (Oral Argument, 0:10:14)
- **Trial-court discretion.** Asked whether the Family Code already gives judges educational and medical decisions, and where "the beef" lies, Gopalan's counsel agreed that discretion belongs to the trial court. (Oral Argument, 0:18:59)
- **Travis County pleading.** Marsh's counsel said Gopalan pleaded, the day before the jury was impaneled, that the children's residence be restricted to Travis County, putting the case within the trial court's discretion. (Oral Argument, 0:22:06)

## Practice Area Tags
family-law

## Procedural Posture/Vehicle
Petition for review from the Third Court of Appeals (Austin) in a divorce case after a jury trial; argued March 4, 2026, and decided May 22, 2026 (Opinion, PDF pp. 1, 3, 18).

## Amicus Involvement
- [Verdict Law PLLC](https://search.txcourts.gov/SearchMedia.aspx?MediaVersionID=190d7ade-e48d-4adc-bc97-371fd3b581e1&coa=cossup&DT=BRIEFS&MediaID=a1f12a03-26fc-45f8-8e3e-25ac1c8febc6) supports Gopalan: the trial court and court of appeals failed to give effect to the plain language of the statute on the primary-residence right.
- [Bollier Ciccone Stinson LLP](https://search.txcourts.gov/SearchMedia.aspx?MediaVersionID=ea2fbdf4-f3b8-49a0-93e1-2d6f18e642f7&coa=cossup&DT=BRIEFS&MediaID=69e4e11c-f6aa-4666-b640-54efe74f92ef) supports Gopalan: the same plain-language argument.
- [Michelle O'Neil](https://search.txcourts.gov/SearchMedia.aspx?MediaVersionID=fb26c4bb-653e-4bea-9a71-601cdb9b1ca8&coa=cossup&DT=BRIEFS&MediaID=3b060841-8319-4ec9-8a51-7b2d3280e6a1) supports Gopalan: a jury's verdict on primary custody carries constitutional force that a trial judge must not dilute.

## Holding
As used in Family Code Section 105.002(c), "primary residence" does not refer to a home where the child lives less time than elsewhere, so awarding Marsh more possession contravened the jury's verdict; the Court remanded the possession order and, because it informs the best-interest analysis, the child-support and parental-rights determinations and the appellate attorney's fee award, and otherwise affirmed (Opinion, PDF pp. 1-2, 11-13, 18).

## Court's Reasoning
**Statutory history.** The Family Code's history shows the Legislature moved from a single custodian with the right to establish the child's domicile to joint managing conservatorship with an exclusive right to designate the primary residence, and in 1997 specified that the court "may not contravene" the jury's determination of the primary residence (Opinion, PDF pp. 4-8).

**Ordinary meaning.** Dictionaries define a "primary residence" as the place where a person lives most of the time, so a home where the child lives less time than elsewhere is not the primary residence as ordinarily understood (Opinion, PDF pp. 10-11). The courts of appeals that read the term as a legal label tied to school enrollment and relocation power did not engage the statute's plain meaning, and the high bar for modifying the right is at odds with that reading (Opinion, PDF pp. 11-12). The verdict imposes a general constraint and does not dictate a "specific term or condition" of possession, so the trial court must redetermine the possession order (Opinion, PDF p. 12).

**Two observations.** The plain meaning does not preclude equal possession periods, because the Code says joint managing conservatorship does not require equal or nearly equal possession, but there can be only one primary residence, and the Court rejected Gopalan's references to the conservator holding that right as the "primary parent," which has no textual basis (Opinion, PDF pp. 13-14).

**Other issues.** The Court found no reversible error in Gopalan's other unrelated challenges to the decree (Opinion, PDF pp. 14-15). On fees, remand is warranted as to Marsh's conditional appellate fees because Gopalan prevailed in part and her evidence does not separate the fees for his unmeritorious issues, but not as to the property division's treatment of her trial fees, which rested on his pretrial conduct (Opinion, PDF pp. 15-17).

## Disposition
The divorce decree's allocation of possession, child support, and parental rights and duties is reversed and remanded, along with the appellate attorney's fee award, for redetermination, and the court of appeals' judgment is otherwise affirmed without prejudice to either party seeking modification of the primary-residence right (Opinion, PDF p. 18).

## Vote Breakdown
Justice Devine delivered the opinion of the Court, with no separate writings (Opinion, PDF p. 1).


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Source: The SCOTX Report, https://scotxreport.com/cases/25-0161. AI-generated summary of the Court's opinion, orders and the parties' briefs, with pin cites to the page of each document; verify against the Court's own documents at search.txcourts.gov.