Case Title: In Re C.K.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 1990-12-01T00:00:00Z

Document:
NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports.
Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
Court, 111 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05602 of any errors in order
that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press.


                                No. 90-550



In re C.K., Juvenile                         Supreme Court

                                             On Appeal from
                                             Franklin Family Court

                                             Special December Term, 1990


John P. Meaker, J.

Howard W. Stalnaker, Franklin County Deputy State's Attorney, St.Albans, for
   petitioner

Jeffrey L. Amestoy, Attorney General, and Alexandra N. Thayer, Assistant
   Attorney General, Waterbury, for SRS

Steve Dunham, Public Defender, St. Albans, for respondent


PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Gibson, Dooley and Johnson, JJ.


     DOOLEY, J.   The State seeks to appeal from an evidentiary ruling in
the detention-hearing stage of a CHINS (child in need of care or
supervision) proceeding.  We dismiss the appeal because it does not satisfy
the collateral final order criteria set out in V.R.A.P. 5.1.
     The following events gave rise to this appeal. (FN1) On November 27, 1990,
seven-year-old C.K. informed a school nurse that her father had sexually
abused her.  After she repeated the allegations to SRS workers and a police
officer, a CHINS petition was filed, and she was taken into custody pursuant
to an ex parte temporary detention order.  See 33 V.S.A. {{ 5510, 5513-5514.
The following day, the girl's father was arraigned on a charge of lewd and
lascivious conduct with a child and released on the condition that he not
contact his daughter.  The hearing on continued detention pending resolution
of the petition commenced on November 29, and was continued until December
4.  See 33 V.S.A. { 5515(a) (court must hold detention hearing within forty-
eight hours of detention order).  The father subpoenaed his daughter to
testify at the hearing, but the State opposed receipt of the child's testi-
mony, arguing that hearsay testimony from the nurse, SRS workers and the
police officer was admissible and sufficient at the detention phase of a
CHINS proceeding.  The court ruled that it would not order further detention
of the child unless the State presented evidence that would be admissible at
the merits hearing.  It proposed that the child testify in an informal
setting, with a social worker known to the child asking court-approved
questions.  The State declined to have the girl testify, and the court
released her into the custody of the mother.  The following day the court
denied the State's motion for permission to appeal its ruling and order
pursuant to V.R.A.P. 5.1. (FN2)
     At the outset, we point out that the standard for reviewing a trial
court's decision to deny permission to file an interlocutory appeal is
whether the trial court abused or withheld its discretion.  State v. McCann,
149 Vt. 147, 151,