IN THE INTEREST OF S.R.W., Minor Child, R.M.W., Mother, Appellant.
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA
No. 9-874 / 09-1378
Filed November 12, 2009
IN THE INTEREST OF S.R.W.,
Minor Child,
R.M.W., Mother,
Appellant.
________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Johnson County, Stephen Gerard,
III, District Associate Judge.
A mother appeals from the order terminating of her parental rights.
AFFIRMED.
Dai Gwilliam of Stein, Moore, Egerton & Weideman, L.L.P., Iowa City, for
appellant.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Kathrine S. Miller-Todd, Assistant
Attorney General, Bryan Tingle, County Attorney, and Kristin L. Parks, Assistant
County Attorney, for appellee.
Considered by Sackett, C.J., Vaitheswaran and Danilson, JJ.
2
SACKETT, C.J.,
Rose, the mother of Sylvia, appeals from the order terminating her
parental rights.
She contends the Department of Human Services “did not
provide timely rehabilitative services” and did not make reasonable efforts to
reunify mother and child. We affirm.
Background Facts and Proceedings. Sylvia’s parents married in 2005
and she was born in March of 2006. The family came to the attention of the
department and the courts in November of 2006 after Rose assaulted her
husband while he was holding Sylvia. Sylvia and her father moved in with his
mother and the court placed the child in her grandmother’s custody. The court
found
the
child
in need
of
assistance
in
early 2007.
It
ordered
psychiatric/psychological evaluations of the parents, to be paid for by the State.
Rose pleaded guilty to domestic abuse assault. A no contact order was issued to
prevent Rose from contact with Sylvia’s father, except through a written journal
established by the court.
Rose had supervised visitation at the department.
Sylvia’s father moved back into the family apartment in April of 2007. Visitation
with him progressed to semi-supervised and then overnight.
Based on a
successful trial home placement, the court returned the child to his custody in
September. Meanwhile, there were repeated violations of the no contact order
that led to increasing periods in jail for Rose and termination of her visitation with
Sylvia. When she was released from a 180-day jail term she assaulted her
mother and was returned to custody.
3
Following her release in July of 2008, Rose contacted the department
seeking visitation. In a meeting between a department worker, Rose, Rose’s
attorney, and a representative of the Builders of Hope program, Rose became
upset and struck the department worker, leading to charges of assault causing
injury. Visitation did not resume.
In the September of 2007 order returning the child to the father’s custody,
the juvenile court granted concurrent jurisdiction to the district court to enter
orders concerning child custody in the action to dissolve the parties’ marriage. In
December of 2008, the parents’ marriage was dissolved and the court placed the
child in the father’s sole custody, finding joint legal custody was not in the child’s
interests.
The court allowed for the concurrent child-in-need-of-assistance
proceedings to resolve the issue of when, or if, visitation should resume with the
mother. Sylvia’s father has since remarried and his current wife desires to adopt
the child.
In 2009, the State petitioned to terminate Rose’s parental rights.
Following a contested hearing in June, the court entered an order in late August
terminating Rose’s parental rights under Iowa Code sections 232.116(1)(h) and
(k) (2009).
Scope and Standards of Review. Our review of termination-of-parentalrights proceedings is de novo. In re J.E., 723 N.W.2d 793, 798 (Iowa 2006). We
review the facts and the law and adjudicate rights anew. In re H.G., 601 N.W.2d
84, 85 (Iowa 1999). We give weight to the juvenile court’s factual findings but are
not bound by them. In re E.H., III, 578 N.W.2d 243, 248 (Iowa 1998).
4
The parent-child relationship is constitutionally protected.
Quilloin v.
Walcott, 434 U.S. 246, 255, 98 S. Ct. 549, 554, 54 L. Ed. 2d 511, 519 (1978);
Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 233, 92 S. Ct. 1526, 1542, 32 L. Ed. 2d 15, 35
(1972). When the juvenile court terminates a parent’s rights, we affirm if clear
and convincing evidence supports the termination under the cited statutory
provision. In re S.R., 600 N.W.2d 63, 64 (Iowa Ct. App. 1999). The State has
the burden of proving the allegations by clear and convincing evidence. See
Iowa Code § 232.117. “Clear and convincing evidence” is evidence leaving “no
serious or substantial doubt about the correctness of the conclusion drawn from
it.” In re D.D., 653 N.W.2d 359, 361 (Iowa 2002).
Merits.
Rose contends the department did not provide timely
rehabilitative services. See Iowa Code § 232.67 (2007). She also contends the
department did not make reasonable efforts to reunite her with her child. See id.
§ 232.102(7), (10). Because we see these two contentions as intertwined, or
different facets of the same claim, we address them together.
Iowa Code section 232.67 states the legislature’s specific objective
underlying child abuse reporting, investigation, and rehabilitation, which is “to
provide the greatest possible protection to victims or potential victims of abuse.”
See McCracken v. Iowa Dep’t of Human Servs., 595 N.W.2d 779, 784 (Iowa
1999).
Included in the means for reaching this objective is “providing
rehabilitative services, where appropriate and whenever possible to abused
children and their families which will stabilize the home environment so that the
family can remain intact without further danger to the child.”
Iowa Code
5
§ 232.37.
Neither the legislature nor the courts have defined the term
“rehabilitative services,” but we believe the services fall within the “reasonable
efforts” set forth in section 232.102.
Section 232.67 does not set forth a
requirement, but is the legislature’s statement of intent. Section 232.102 adds a
more-detailed description of the efforts the department should undertake to keep
a family together or to make reunification possible. See id. § 232.102(10)(a)
(defining “reasonable efforts” as “the efforts made to preserve and unify a family
prior to the out-of-home placement, . . . to eliminate the need for removal, . . . or
make it possible for the child to safely return to the family's home”).
Rose argues she filed an “Application for Services” in January of 2008 that
stated it was “unreasonable for someone suffering from a serious mental illness
to be solely responsible for addressing her own mental health needs.”
She
complains that the court did not arrange for services or arrange for payment of
services, but merely “encourage[d] Rose to obtain psychiatric care and to
address her psych issues in order to reinstate visitation.” She recounts her own
enrollment in the Builders of Hope and STEPPS1 programs to address some of
her needs. She also participated in treatment at the Community Mental Health
Center for Mid-Eastern Iowa. She further argues the department made no further
efforts to reunify her with her daughter after the petition to terminate her parental
rights was filed in March of 2009.
1
STEPPS is an acronym for Systems Training for Emotional Predictability and Problem
Solving, a cognitive-behavioral systems-based group treatment in Iowa City for persons
with borderline personality disorder.
6
This case is particularly unfortunate because Rose’s family’s involvement
with the department during her childhood, based on allegations of physical and
sexual abuse by her father, left her with a deep distrust of the department. She
blames the department for her father’s suicide and for how she believes it
mistreated her mother. During the case before us, Rose had trouble working
with department staff and responded poorly to the department’s attempts to work
with her. She wrote a letter to the court asking if there was some way she didn’t
have to work with the department.
From our review of the record we find clear and convincing evidence that
the department made reasonable efforts to reunify the family, including
rehabilitative services for the mother. From before the initiation of this case, the
mother was treated for and received medication for mental health issues,
including major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and emotional
intensity disorder. Although she vigorously resisted releasing her mental health
records to the department, she eventually signed releases for access to her
records. Although consistent therapy, other than medication, was not possible
because of the mother’s repeated violations of the no contact order that resulted
in repeated periods in jail, the record shows the mother did receive mental health
therapy during some periods when she was not in jail and received medication
even while in jail. In 2009 she participated in the STEPPS program and met
regularly with a therapist.
The mother refused or did not take advantage of
services provided by the department, other than supervised visitation.
7
Although Rose’s second issue is phrased as a challenge to the
department’s “reasonable efforts” toward reunification, the argument reveals the
claim is that clear and convincing evidence does not support a finding that
reasonable efforts were made, as required in the statutory grounds for
termination. She argues the sections cited by the court, 232.116(1)(h)(4) and
232.116(1)(k)(1) (2009) “both implicate the requirement that the Department
make reasonable effort towards reunification under [section] 232.102.” “[T]he
reasonable efforts requirement is not viewed as a strict substantive requirement
of termination.” In re C.B., 611 N.W.2d 489, 493 (Iowa 2000). “Instead, the
scope of the efforts by the [department] to reunify parent and child after removal
impacts the burden of proving those elements of termination [that] require
reunification efforts.” Id. Reasonable efforts are part of the State’s ultimate proof
a child cannot be safely returned to the care of a parent. Id.
In considering Rose’s first claim we found clear and convincing evidence
the department made reasonable efforts to reunify the family, including
rehabilitative services. Both Sylvia’s mother and father were offered services.
Her father took advantage of the services and progressed through semisupervised visitation and a trial home placement to have Sylvia returned to his
custody.
Rose resisted the department’s efforts to help her and also was
repeatedly unavailable to take advantage of services because she spent
repeated times in jail for more than sixty violations of the no contact order. At the
time of the termination hearing, she was not in a position to have Sylvia returned
to her care as provided in section 232.102 despite the department’s efforts.
8
Clear and convincing evidence supports termination of Rose’s parental rights
under section 232.116(1)(h). Therefore we need not address her evidentiary
challenge relating to section 232.116(1)(k). See In re S.R., 600 N.W.2d 63, 64
(Iowa Ct. App. 1999) (holding we only need to find grounds to terminate parental
rights under one of the statutory grounds cited by the court in order to affirm).
AFFIRMED.
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