Parental rights’ case dismissed; chief judge objects

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Over the vehement dissent of its chief judge, Maryland‘s top court on Monday declined to decide whether circuit court judges can terminate parental rights while the parent is appealing an earlier judicial order that changed the permanency plan for their child from foster care.

In a one-sentence order, the Court of Appeals found the challenge to the termination of parental rights was moot, since the appeal in the permanency plan case had been resolved against the parents.

Chief Judge Robert M. Bell, in a 21-page dissent, agreed the case was moot but said the court should still have resolved the underlying issue because judges need to know whether to stay TPR proceedings while a parent’s appeal is pending in the underlying Child in Need of Assistance (CINA) case. Bell said he would have held that judges cannot terminate the parental rights.

“Given the importance of a parent’s constitutional right to raise his or her children, and the interference that a TPR proceeding potentially presents to that right, it is our duty, if it be within our authority, to ensure that those proceedings are conducted properly, and in such manner that those rights are properly safeguarded,” Bell wrote in his dissent joined by Judge Clayton Greene Jr.

“Accordingly, not only do I believe we should have decided the issue presented, but should have, upon reviewing it, held that a circuit court may not adjudicate TPR/guardianship proceedings while an appeal of the CINA order changing the permanency plan from reunification to non-relative adoption, by the very parties whose parental rights are at stake, is still pending in an appellate court.”

The Court of Appeals’ dismissal ended the appeal by a mother and father — identified in court papers as Virginia H. and Aaron R. — of the termination of their parental rights regarding their now 5-year-old son, Cross H, in October 2010.

In an earlier proceeding, the Court of Appeals had declined to hear the mother’s appeal of a Howard County Circuit Court judge’s March 26, 2010, order that changed the permanency plan for the child from reunification to adoption by a non-relative.

The Court of Special Appeals held on July 21, 2011, that that high court’s refusal to review that adoption order rendered moot the parents’ challenge to the judge’s TPR decision.

The parents then sought the Court of Appeals’ review of the TPR order. The high court heard arguments in the case on Jan. 9, 2012, but dismissed the case as moot on Monday.

Bell

WHAT THE COURT HELD

Case:

In Re: Adoption/Guardianship of Cross H., No. 78 Sept. Term 2011. Reported. Per curiam order. Dissent by Bell, C.J. Argued Jan. 9, 2012. Filed April 29, 2013.

Issue:

Can a judge proceed with a Termination of Parental Rights hearing when the parents’ appeal of the Child in Need of Assistance order changing the permanency plan to non-relative adoption is pending?

Holding:

Dismissed as moot because the parents’ appeal, which they lost, is no longer pending.

Counsel:

Nenutzka C. Villamar for petitioner; Ann Sheridan and Constance J. Ridgway for respondent.

RecordFax #13-0429-20 (24 pages).