IN THE INTEREST OF P.S., Minor Children, R.C., Father, Appellant.
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA
No. 6-891 / 06-1560
Filed November 30, 2006
IN THE INTEREST OF P.S.,
Minor Children,
R.C., Father,
Appellant.
________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Lee (South) County, Gary R.
Noneman, District Associate Judge.
A father appeals the district court’s permanency ruling. AFFIRMED.
Emily S. Dean of Saunders, Humphrey, Johnson & Dean, L.L.P., Fort
Madison, for appellant father.
Kendra Abfalter, Keokuk, for mother.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Bruce Kempkes, Assistant Attorney
General, Michael Short, County Attorney, and David Andrusyk, Assistant County
Attorney, for appellee State.
Laura Krehbiel, Donnellson, for minor children.
Considered by Mahan, P.J., and Miller and Vaitheswaran, JJ.
2
PER CURIAM
A father appeals the district court’s permanency ruling. He argues (1) the
Iowa Department of Human Services (DHS) failed to provide services for
unification; (2) the permanency ruling is not in the child’s best interests; and
(3) the State failed to show the child could not be placed in the father’s home.
We affirm.
I. Background Facts and Proceedings
Richard and Natasha are the parents of P.S., born in February 2001.
Richard resides with his mother in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, while Natasha and
P.S. currently reside in Keokuk, Iowa.
Sometime in 2004, Natasha left P.S. in
her mother’s care while she was on probation and there were outstanding
warrants for her arrest. Richard told a child protective worker that he planned to
take P.S. to Milwaukee. He also told DHS Natasha and P.S. had lived with him
and that he cared for P.S. for a few months while Natasha was in jail. He stated
that he had not seen P.S. since July 2003. He claimed he maintained telephone
contact with Natasha. He had never paid child support.
On October 8, 2004, the State filed a petition alleging P.S. was a child in
need of assistance (CINA). At the initial hearing, Richard reported he had no job,
no income, and no assets worth more than $100. He also claimed to have two
children living with him. Richard did not appear at two subsequent hearings,
though his counsel was present. P.S. was adjudicated CINA on December 3,
2004. Richard filed an appeal, but time on the appeal was allowed to expire.
3
On June 20, 2005, paternity tests established Richard as P.S.’s biological
father. A month later, the court ordered Richard to complete a home study.
Richard filed another notice of appeal. The supreme court dismissed his appeal
on November 9, 2005.
A permanency hearing was held on December 1, 2005 and January 5
and 31, 2006, during which Richard testified. He provided long, confusing, and
often nongermane answers to direct questions asked about his personal,
educational, work, and criminal history. The court was unable to determine a
straight-forward, chronological history of what he had been doing in the last
twenty years. Further, it also noted there was little documentary evidence to
verify his testimony. 1
The court found reasonable efforts had been made to
provide Richard with services.
It ordered him to complete a mental health
evaluation and parental skills training.
It also ordered visitation at DHS’s
discretion.
Another permanency hearing was held September 7, 2006. In its ruling
the court again noted at length both the inconsistencies in Richard’s statements
to DHS and the court and its inability to discern anything of Richard’s personal
background. The ruling stated
The bottom line is that Richard himself has not truly demonstrated
any sustained commitment to raising or even regularly seeing [P.S.]
and that he views the efforts of everyone else to improve his
parenting skills as an unjustified waste of his time. Indeed,
[Richard] has come to hearings and DHS staffings and has talked
about being [P.S.]’s parent, but in terms of actual substantive follow
1
In addition to his testimony, Richard has sent several letters to the court and his
attorneys during this case. In one of the letters, dated January 5, 2005, Richard
accused the court, DHS, and various attorneys of issuing “an untrue, unjust, and illegal
order against him,” kidnapping his child, and extorting money from him.
4
through, deeds have been lacking. He has paid no financial
support. He has visited his son largely only at times that coincided
with court proceedings or DHS meetings.
He missed two
scheduled visits in July and August of 2006. When actual visits
have taken place, the social worker has noted a lack of true parentchild interaction between Richard and [P.S.], even to the point of
[Richard]’s acting like it was the social worker’s job to deal with
[P.S.]’s behaviors on visits rather than his own job to do so.
The court ruled that visitation should continue with Richard according to DHS’s
discretion and that P.S. should stay with his maternal grandmother. Richard
appeals.
II. Standard of Review
Our review of permanency orders is de novo. In re A.A.G., 708 N.W.2d
85, 90 (Iowa Ct. App. 2005).
III. Merits
After careful review of the record, we must affirm the district court’s
permanency ruling. Richard has received sufficient services from DHS. 2 It is
Richard himself who has failed to take advantage of them. Though he expresses
a desire to have P.S. placed in his care, he provides nothing other than demands
that we should do so simply because he is the child’s biological father. Richard
would also have us move his young son to a state he does not remember to live
with individuals he does not know and who have not been involved in the case. It
is clearly in P.S.’s best interests to stay with his grandmother where he can be
near his mother, younger sister, and other maternal relatives. Finally, Richard
has not demonstrated, even at supervised visitation, that he can perform even
2
The guardian ad litem argues we do not have to address services offered to Robert.
However, because we find services were sufficient, we decline to address that
argument.
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the most rudimentary of parenting activities. It is clear P.S. cannot be placed in
his home.
AFFIRMED.
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