The Lawyers' Arguments
Closing arguments from both sides — how each attorney would present the same evidence.
Part A: Mr. Choplin's Attorney
Closing Argument
Your Honor, the evidence in this case is not a matter of "he said, she said." It is a matter of "he texted, she didn't respond." Five thousand one hundred eighteen times, this record documents exactly what happened between these two parents. There is no ambiguity. There is no interpretation required. The timestamps are the witnesses.
My client, Jason Choplin, has been a model co-parent. Not a perfect one — no one is. But a consistent, engaged, responsive one. For six years, he has asked about his daughter's health, her schoolwork, her activities. He has responded to every message from Ms. Rogers within the hour. He has accommodated every reasonable schedule request. He has done everything the court would want a co-parent to do.
And what has he received in return?
This is not a communication problem. This is a gatekeeping pattern. It is systematic, documented, and ongoing.
Exhibit: The Call Requests
One hundred forty-two times, Mr. Choplin asked to speak with Adele during Ms. Rogers' custodial time. "Can you have Delly call me?" "Is she free to FaceTime?" "Tell her to call me when she gets a chance." These are not unreasonable requests. They are a father asking to talk to his child. And the record shows what happened: ignored, deflected, or acknowledged with no follow-through.
Exhibit: The Self-Harm Disclosure
On May 19, 2022, Mr. Choplin texted that Adele was self-harming and expressing suicidal ideation. Ms. Rogers did not deny it. She did not dispute it. She moved on.
Your Honor, if your child told the other parent they wanted to kill themselves, would you move on? Would you not immediately coordinate to get that child help? The silence on this issue is deafening.
Exhibit: The Style Shift
For five years, Ms. Rogers wrote one way. Then, in 2025, someone else started writing her messages. Seventy messages flagged as style anomalies — formal, legalistic language completely inconsistent with her five-year baseline.
"You as the parent should have communicated with me in reference to any health concerns."
Does that sound like a mother texting her co-parent? Or does it sound like a detective writing a report?
My client noticed. On April 3, 2025, he texted: "Is this Melanie I'm texting with?" He knew. The data confirms what he knew.
Exhibit: The False Claims
"You and I never discussed her having a yeast infection." "She never informed me of any type of dental pain." "I do not have any missed calls from you." Three claims, made in the formal/legalistic style, each contradicted by the record. These are not mistakes. These are calculated denials designed to create a written record — exactly what a law enforcement professional would know to do.
Jason Choplin is not asking for anything extraordinary. He is asking to be a father.
To talk to his daughter. To know about her health. To be involved in her education. To not be erased from her life every time she walks through her mother's door.
The text record shows he has earned that right through six years of consistent, documented parenting. It also shows that the other side has spent the last four years systematically trying to take it away.
We respectfully request that the court's order reflect the reality documented in these messages.
Part B: Ms. Rogers' Attorney
Closing Argument (opposing side's best counter-arguments)
Your Honor, opposing counsel would have you believe that a text message record tells the full story of this family. It does not.
Text messages are fragments. They are one-sided snapshots that do not capture phone calls that were answered, conversations that happened in person, school pickups that went smoothly, doctor visits that were coordinated without a text thread. My client has been co-parenting for six years, and to reduce that to a statistical analysis of response times is to miss the forest for the trees.
On Response Times
Mr. Choplin texts frequently. Very frequently. Three thousand messages in six years — more than one per day, every day. My client has a life. She has a child to raise. She has a household to manage. That she does not respond to every message within an hour does not make her a gatekeeper. It makes her a human being who is busy raising a daughter.
The court should not penalize a parent for not being chained to their phone.
On Communication with Adele
My client has never prevented Adele from speaking with her father. When Adele has wanted to call her dad, she has been allowed to. The claim that "fifty requests were ignored" conflates "not immediately facilitated" with "blocked."
A child who is eating dinner, taking a bath, doing homework, or already asleep is not being gatekept. She is being parented. My client should not be required to interrupt her child's routine every time Mr. Choplin sends a text asking for a FaceTime session.
On the "Style Analysis"
Opposing counsel has introduced a novel theory: that my client's text messages were written by her partner because the vocabulary changed. This is speculation dressed up as data science.
People's writing styles evolve. When you are engaged in a legal dispute, you become more careful with your words. You use more precise language. You document more carefully. This is not evidence of third-party authorship. It is evidence of a mother who understands she is in a legal proceeding and is communicating accordingly.
The "style analysis" is an algorithm, not a witness, and algorithms do not know who is holding the phone.
On the Self-Harm Claim
Mr. Choplin's text references Adele's self-harm in the context of an argument. He was making an accusation, not filing a report. My client's decision not to engage with an accusatory text about a sensitive topic does not constitute an admission. Silence in a text message is not evidence.
On False Claims
Opposing counsel characterizes my client's statements as "false claims." My client's statements reflect her good-faith understanding of events at the time they were made. Disagreement about what was communicated is not the same as lying. "You and I never discussed this" may mean "I don't recall us discussing this" — a distinction that anyone in an ongoing custody dispute would recognize.
Custody is not determined by response-time metrics and vocabulary scoring algorithms.
It is determined by the best interest of the child. Adele has been safe, healthy, and cared for in my client's home. She has been enrolled in school, taken to doctors, provided with a stable household.
We ask the court to see the whole picture, not just the picture painted by an algorithm.