In a surprise ruling, the California Court of Appeal has just issued a temporary stay, preventing a Georgia father from relocating his children out of California:

Melissa Cook – the California surrogate mom at the center of a custody battle over triplets she delivered last month – has been granted a temporary stay on a Los Angeles Court’s ruling that previously granted custody of her newborn triplets to their biological father. The new development prohibits the father, who is based in Georgia, from removing the children from California.

Per the court’s ruling, the infants will remain in California until a new decision has been made by the court. Cook, a Woodland Hills mother of four, filed lawsuits against the triplets’ biological father, asking for custody of the three baby boys and to have California’s surrogacy law declared unconstitutional.

I’ll have more thoughts on this once the ruling becomes available. Needless to say, this is an unexpected development. However, without the benefit of the court’s full ruling, I’d caution against reading too much into this temporary stay.