Q: Can I seek financial retribution from child academy for forwarding emails to other parent in custody battle situation?

A: Unless you had sole legal custody at the time your child was in daycare and the emails were sent, or there was some contractual agreement covering confidentiality of communications, both parents would have access to their child's records at daycare. Even then, that would not prohibit an opposing party from presenting such evidence at trial. Your emails would be part of your child's daycare file. There is also no expectation of privacy in emails you send to others, which grants you a right to prohibit the recipient from sharing those emails with someobdy else. You therefore have no claim against the daycare facility for sharing your emails, nor would you have any civil right to damages against someone who testifies at a trial to matters within their personal knowledge unless there was a recognized legal privilege protecting your communications with that person, such as a patient-psychiatrist relationship, and even then there are exceptions to your invoking your privilege. In order to assert such a privilege, you must do so at the trial where the testimony is presented, and get a judge to rule in your favor. If you failed to object at trial, or your objection was overruled, then the witness and their employer would have no liability for providing testimony the judge allowed. There is no recognized legal privilege between a parent and their child's daycare provider, so even had you objected, you would not have prevailed in keeping the testimony out. Any litigant can subpoena or call any witness who can testify as to facts relevant in a case. They cannot be held liable simply for doing so. Any lawsuit you would file would be summarily dismissed as without merit, and potentially result in sanctions for being a frivolous lawsuit.