Case Title: In re Child of Kimberlee C.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 2018 ME 134

State: maine

Court: Maine Supreme Court

Date: 2018-10-04T00:00:00Z

Document:
MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2018 ME 134  
Docket: 
Yor-18-71 
Submitted 
On Briefs: September 26, 2018 
Decided: 
October 4, 2018 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, and HUMPHREY, JJ. 
 
 
IN RE CHILD OF KIMBERLEE C.  
 
 
PER CURIAM 
[¶1]  Kimberlee C. appeals from a judgment of the District Court 
(Springvale, Foster, J.) terminating her parental rights to her youngest child.1  
She argues that there is insufficient evidence to support the court’s finding of 
parental unfitness and that she received ineffective assistance of counsel during 
the hearing on the termination of her parental rights.  We affirm the judgment.   
I.  BACKGROUND 
[¶2]  The Department of Health and Human Services filed a child 
protection petition with respect to six of the mother’s children, including the 
                                         
1  The mother’s parental rights to six of her seven children were terminated together; however, 
she only appeals the termination of her rights as to her youngest child.  The child’s father consented 
to the termination of his parental rights and is not a party to the appeal.  The mother’s oldest child, 
age thirteen, was placed with his father in Connecticut at the time the petition was filed and, 
therefore, was not a subject of the ongoing case.  The older children are discussed only insofar as they 
affect the child at issue in this appeal.   
 
 
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youngest child, in February 2016, when the youngest child was three years old.  
22 M.R.S. § 4032 (2017).  The Department alleged that the mother, who had a 
history of mental health and substance abuse issues, was unable to provide safe 
and sanitary housing for herself and the children and was unable to manage the 
behavioral health needs of her children.  On May 11, 2016, the court (Foster, J.) 
entered a jeopardy order, with the parties’ agreement, that placed the children, 
including the youngest, in the custody of the Department.   
[¶3]  The Department petitioned for termination of the mother’s parental 
rights on January 19, 2017.  After a two-day testimonial hearing, by judgment 
dated February 1, 2018, the court terminated the mother’s parental rights.  See 
22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(B)(2) (2017).  The court made the following findings of 
fact, which are supported by competent record evidence.  See id.; In re A.M., 
2012 ME 118, ¶ 29, 55 A.3d 463.  
After 2013 or so, [the mother] was the single parent of seven 
children, ranging in age from eleven years to less than one year old.   
 
[The mother] was not particularly well-suited to the task at 
hand.  She has long-standing mental health issues that she has 
attempted to address through counseling. . . .  She also developed a 
substance abuse problem around the time [the five-year-old twins] 
were born, using opiates and pain medications.  After [her youngest 
child] was born, she added intravenous heroin use to her list of 
behaviors.    
 
. . . .  
 
3 
 
. . . The disclosures [that the children made about life in the 
mother’s household] are overwhelming[ly] consistent over time 
and among the children; they have been made to caseworkers, 
foster 
parents, 
therapists 
and 
Child 
Advocacy 
Center 
interviewers. . . .  Although all of these children have shared many 
of the same experiences, they have experienced them in different 
ways and responded in their own fashion. . . .  [The youngest child] 
may have seen even less but was the subject of direct abuse by [a 
sibling].  The effect of that abuse, if any, is not yet known. 
 
. . . .  
 
 
It is clear that [the mother] has made sincere efforts to 
reunify with her children.  She has participated in reunification and 
rehabilitation services recommended by the Department.  She 
attended individual mental health counseling with [a counselor] 
for approximately one year but was unable to work on her own 
trauma history or make much headway on the issue of domestic 
violence. . . .  The topic of [the mother’s] complicity in the extensive 
abuse her children suffered has not yet been raised in therapy.   
 
 
[The mother] also periodically participated in substance 
abuse treatment.  It was not a smooth process.   
 
 . . . . 
 
 
Ultimately, 
however, 
the 
[c]ourt 
returns 
to 
[the 
neuropsychologist’s] recommendation that any decision about 
reunification begin with an assessment of [the mother’s] 
capabilities and the likelihood of success. . . .  [The mother] does not 
have a history of healthy attachments to her parents or her 
partners.  She has virtually no support network of family or friends.  
She has not been employed on a steady basis.  She has struggled 
with substance abuse and mental health issues for many years, and 
been in and out of treatment programs.  She has yet to address her 
own mental health issues.  [The mother] has none of the indicia 
 
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listed by [the neuropsychologist] as predictive of success in 
resuming healthy parenting of her children.   
 
 
These children are stuck.  They cannot go home; their mother 
is totally unprepared to manage their behaviors, respond to their 
accusations and reassure them of their safety.    
 
[¶4]  Based on these findings, the court found that the mother, despite 
her efforts, remains unable to protect the youngest child from jeopardy or take 
responsibility for the child within a time that is reasonably calculated to meet 
the child’s needs.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i), (ii) (2017); In re 
Thomas D., 2004 ME 104, ¶ 21, 854 A.2d 195.  The mother appeals.  See 22 
M.R.S. § 4006. 
II.  DISCUSSION  
[¶5]  The mother makes two arguments on appeal.  First, she challenges 
the sufficiency of the evidence supporting the termination of her parental rights 
to the child.  She argues that the court relied on speculative, unchallenged 
testimony from the Department’s expert witness, a neuropsychologist, to find 
that the child was the subject of abuse at the hands of his siblings and that his 
mother failed to prevent this abuse.  We review the District Court’s findings of 
fact for clear error.  In re Logan M. 2017 ME 23, ¶ 3, 155 A.3d 430.  “Deference 
is paid to [the District Court’s] superior perspective for evaluating the weight 
and credibility of evidence.”  In re Scott S. 2001 ME 114, ¶ 10, 775 A.2d 1144 
 
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(quoting In re Leona T., 609 A.2d 1157, 1158 (Me. 1992)); see also Dyer v. 
Superintendent of Ins., 2013 ME 61, ¶ 12, 69 A.3d 416.  There is sufficient 
evidence to support each of these findings with regard to the specific abuse 
suffered by the child.  The court, therefore, did not err in its conclusion that the 
mother was unable to protect the child from jeopardy or take responsibility for 
him within a time that is reasonably calculated to meet the child’s needs.  See 
22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i), (ii); In re Thomas D., 2004 ME 104, ¶ 21, 854 
A.2d 195.    
[¶6]  Second, the mother raises a claim that her counsel at the 
termination proceeding was ineffective.2  A parent claiming ineffective 
assistance of counsel in a termination proceeding must demonstrate that 
(1) “counsel’s performance was deficient, i.e., that there has been serious 
incompetency, inefficiency, or inattention of counsel amounting to 
performance . . . below what might be expected from an ordinary fallible 
attorney,” and (2) the parent was “prejudiced by the attorney's deficient 
performance in that counsel’s conduct so undermined the proper functioning 
of the adversarial process that the trial cannot be relied on as having produced 
                                         
2  A parent may properly claim ineffective assistance of counsel in a termination proceeding on 
direct appeal from the termination judgment where “the record does not need to be supplemented 
to support her claim.”  In re M.P., 2015 ME 138, ¶ 27, 126 A.3d 718. 
 
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a just result.”  In re M.P., 2015 ME 138, ¶ 27, 126 A.3d 718 (quotation marks and 
citations omitted).  Although the mother argues that her attorney failed to 
provide adequate assistance directly before and during the termination of 
parental rights hearing, the mother has failed to make a prima facie showing of 
ineffective assistance of counsel as is required.  See id.  Contrary to the mother’s 
arguments, her attorney made several objections, including at least one 
objection sustained by the court, and elicited testimony regarding the mother’s 
participation in substance abuse treatment and mental health counseling.  
Moreover, her attorney rigorously cross-examined each witness, some multiple 
times, and the mother had the opportunity to testify on her own behalf and did 
so.  Nothing in the record suggests that her attorney’s performance fell “below 
what might be expected from an ordinary fallible attorney” or that she was 
prejudiced by her attorney’s performance such that the trial “cannot be relied 
on as having produced a just result.”  In re Child of Stephen E., 2018 ME 71, ¶ 13, 
186 A.3d 134.  
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
7 
 
 
Roger M. Champagne, Esq., Law Office of Roger M. Champagne, LLC, Biddeford, 
for appellant Mother 
 
Janet T. Mills, Attorney General and Meghan Szylvian, Asst. Atty. Gen., Office of 
the Attorney General, Augusta, for appellee Department of Health and Human 
Services 
 
 
Springvale District Court docket number PC-2016-10 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY