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Balekian Hayes: Double Board Certified in Family Law and Child Welfare, a Rare Combination

Kris Balekian Hayes holds a credential very few Texas family lawyers can claim: double board certification, in both Family Law and Child Welfare Law. That pairing reflects a career that started defending family-violence allegations at the district attorney’s office before she moved to representing families directly in the highest-conflict divorce and custody matters Dallas courts see. This profile is part of Awesome Attorneys’ coverage of Dallas family law attorney options.

At a Glance

Origin & Background

Kris Balekian Hayes earned her B.B.A. from Southern Methodist University and a joint J.D./M.B.A. from St. Mary’s University School of Law in 2000, and was admitted to the State Bar of Texas in 2001. Before founding her own practice, she spent several years at the district attorney’s office handling cases involving allegations of family violence — direct experience she now applies to family law cases involving domestic conflict. She founded her firm (originally The Law Office of Kris J. Balekian, PC) in 2019 in the Dallas area, later restructured as Balekian Hayes, PLLC, with a stated mission of providing compassionate, strategic guidance in high-conflict and high-profile divorces. She is a credentialed mediator across civil, family, and CPS matters, and is additionally licensed in Georgia, Oklahoma, and Missouri.

Dallas Family Law Attorney Practice Concentration

The firm practices exclusively in family law: contested and uncontested divorce (including high-asset and executive divorce), child custody and possession schedules, custody modifications, CPS mediation and defense, property division (including business interests and executive compensation), spousal support, and same-sex family matters. The firm markets targeted practice pages for specific client situations — divorce for men, for women, for executives, for doctors, for professional athletes — reflecting a deliberate strategy of addressing the distinct financial and custody concerns each group tends to face.

Track Record

As a family law firm, Balekian Hayes does not publish individual case settlement or custody outcomes given the private nature of these matters. The firm’s public recognition instead comes through peer-nomination channels (Best Lawyers, Super Lawyers) and direct client reviews; past recognition does not guarantee future outcomes.

Client Voice

Balekian Hayes carries 40 reviews on Birdeye and a 5.0-out-of-5.0 Avvo rating (6 reviews) for Kris Hayes individually, with no negative reviews identified during this research:

“Kris Hayes is without a doubt the best attorney our family could have hired. She has great instincts and you can tell she analyzes things very quickly to come up with the best strategy.” — Avvo client review

“I highly recommend Kris Hayes. She is honest, reasonably priced, and thoroughly advises you so you can make the best decision. I couldn’t have done it without her.” — Birdeye client review

Other reviews specifically praise partner Justin Whiddon and associate-level attorneys for responsiveness and case management, suggesting consistent service quality across the firm’s attorneys rather than results concentrated on the founder alone.

Beyond the Courtroom

Hayes serves as a credentialed mediator across civil, family, and CPS matters — a role distinct from litigation that requires separate training and certification in facilitating settlement rather than advocating for one side. Partner John H. Withers Jr. has been recognized by Best Lawyers in Family Law since 2022, and associate Monique Sneed was newly recognized by Best Lawyers in 2026, indicating the firm has developed recognized talent beyond its founder.

Recognition

Hayes’s double Board Certification — Family Law and Child Welfare Law, both from the Texas Board of Legal Specialization — is a genuinely rare combination and the credential this profile treats as most substantive; each certification independently requires the exam, peer-reference, and continuing-education process, so holding both reflects sustained expertise across two related but distinct specialty areas (general family law and the CPS/child-welfare-specific track). She carries an Avvo “Superb” rating and has been recognized in Best Lawyers in America; these are legitimate peer-nomination and review-based honors but sit on a different, less rigorous tier than board certification.

Texas Legal Backdrop

Texas is a community property state under Texas Family Code § 3.002, and a divorce cannot be finalized until at least 60 days after filing under Family Code § 6.702, absent family violence. Child custody follows the conservatorship framework in Family Code Chapter 153. For the firm’s CPS-related practice — an area where Hayes’s dual certification is particularly relevant — Texas Department of Family and Protective Services investigations and removal proceedings operate under Family Code Chapter 261, a civil child-protection track that can run parallel to, but is legally distinct from, any criminal family-violence charges arising from the same underlying facts.

Awesome Attorneys Assessment

Kris Balekian Hayes’s double board certification in Family Law and Child Welfare Law is a genuinely distinctive credential combination, directly relevant to the firm’s stated focus on high-conflict cases that frequently involve both divorce/custody disputes and CPS or family-violence allegations simultaneously. The firm’s consistent, multi-platform positive review record (40 Birdeye reviews, 5.0 Avvo rating, no misconduct findings) and its success developing additional recognized attorneys (Withers, Sneed) beyond the founder both support a genuinely deep practice rather than a single-attorney operation with junior support.

Prospective clients should note the firm’s marketing leans into a broad range of specialized client-type pages (executives, doctors, athletes, men, women) — a reasonable positioning strategy, but one where it’s worth confirming directly which attorney would actually handle a given case, since the firm has grown beyond Hayes as sole practitioner.

Methodology & Sourcing

This profile was compiled from the firm’s own website (bh-pllc.com and balekianhayes.com, including its About Us, Hayes attorney bio, and practice-area pages), Krista Balekian Hayes’s Avvo attorney profile (including bar-record and misconduct data), Super Lawyers’ individual attorney profile, Best Lawyers’ firm profile, Birdeye’s aggregated review page, and the firm’s Better Business Bureau file. Statutory citations were checked against the Texas Family Code. No case results, credentials, or quotes were invented; all client reviews are attributed to their original platform.

Publisher Disclosure & Independence Notice

Awesome Attorneys is an independent legal directory and editorial publication. This profile was not paid for, commissioned, or reviewed by Balekian Hayes, PLLC prior to publication. Awesome Attorneys may in the future offer sponsored placements clearly labeled as such, but no payment of any kind determines inclusion in, or the content of, this editorial profile. This article is for informational purposes only, does not constitute legal advice, and does not create an attorney-client relationship between the reader and Balekian Hayes or Awesome Attorneys.