IN RE DOMINQUE ISAAC BERMEIRE JOHNSON MINOR
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STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS
In the Matter of DOMINQUE ISAAC BERMEIRE
JOHNSON, Minor.
FAMILY INDEPENDENCE AGENCY,
UNPUBLISHED
January 27, 2004
Petitioner-Appellee,
v
No. 248502
Macomb Circuit Court
Family Division
LC No. 01-051870-NA
MICHAEL ANTHONY JOHNSON,
Respondent-Appellant,
and
TERRA LATESE POPE,
Respondent.
Before: Donofrio, P.J., and Griffin and Jansen, JJ.
MEMORANDUM.
Respondent-appellant appeals as of right from the trial court’s order terminating his
parental rights to the minor child under MCL 712A.19b(3)(g). We affirm. This appeal is being
decided without oral argument pursuant to MCR 7.214(E)(1)(b).
The trial court did not clearly err in finding that the statutory ground for termination was
established by clear and convincing evidence. MCR 5.974(I), now MCR 3.977(J); In re Miller,
433 Mich 331, 337; 445 NW2d 161 (1989). When the child first came into care, at the age of
eight, respondent-appellant had served seven years of an eight to forty-year sentence for armed
robbery and aggravated assault. At the termination hearing, respondent-appellant testified that
he had been denied parole a month before the hearing and claimed that his parole had been
postponed because of his enrollment in an assault offenders program required of him by the
parent-agency agreement. Respondent-appellant expected that his next parole hearing would be
held before the end of the year and stated that there was a good chance he would be released.
Respondent-appellant, however, did not provide the court with any plans regarding how he
would take care of the child if in fact he was paroled. No other testimony was presented to the
court that would give an indication of when he might be paroled. The trial court found that
respondent-appellant had complied to the best of his ability with the parent-agency agreement,
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but the court did not know whether respondent-appellant could provide proper care and custody
for the child within a reasonable time.
Based on the length of respondent-appellant’s sentence, the uncertainty of parole, the lack
of a plan for the care of the child both during and after release from prison, the trial court did not
clearly err in determining that respondent-appellant had failed to provide care or custody of the
minor child and there was not a reasonable likelihood that he could do so within a reasonable
time given the child’s age.
Further, the evidence did not show that termination of respondent-appellant’s parental
rights was clearly not in the child’s best interests. MCL 712A.19b(5); In re Trejo, 462 Mich 341,
356-357; 612 NW2d 407 (2000). Respondent-appellant had been incarcerated since the child
was one year old. Although there had been a few telephone calls and a few visits early on, the
only contact between respondent-appellant and the minor child since that time was through the
letters that respondent-appellant sent to the child. The court’s finding regarding the child’s best
interests was not clearly erroneous.
Affirmed.
/s/ Pat M. Donofrio
/s/ Richard Allen Griffin
/s/ Kathleen Jansen
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