Case Title: In re Child of Gustavus E.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 2018 ME 43

State: maine

Court: Maine Supreme Court

Date: 2018-03-22T00:00:00Z

Document:
MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2018 ME 43 
Docket: 
And-17-334 
Submitted 
On Briefs: March 7, 2018 
Decided: 
March 22, 2018 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, HJELM, and HUMPHREY, JJ. 
 
 
IN RE CHILD OF GUSTAVUS E. 
 
 
PER CURIAM 
[¶1]  In this child protection action commenced by three petitioners, the 
father of the child appeals from a judgment entered by the District Court 
(Lewiston, Dow, J.) terminating his parental rights pursuant to 22 M.R.S. 
§ 4055(1)(A)(1)(b) and (B)(2)(a), (b)(i)-(ii) (2017).  The father primarily 
contends that the court erred by invoking the “rebuttable presumption” 
contained in 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1-A)(A), (B)(8) (2017) in its unfitness analysis 
because, he asserts, the evidence in its entirety does not support a finding of 
unfitness.  Additionally, he argues that there is insufficient record evidence to 
support the court’s finding that termination of his parental rights is in the 
child’s best interest.  Because the court did not err in either respect, we affirm 
the judgment.   
 
2 
I.  BACKGROUND 
[¶2]  In September 2016, the mother, along with two other petitioners, 
filed a petition for child protection, see 22 M.R.S. § 4032(1)(C) (2017), which 
alleged that the child was in jeopardy due to the father’s recent conviction of 
unlawful sexual contact (Class C), 17-A M.R.S. § 255-A(1)(M) (2017).1  In 
October 2016, the Department of Health and Human Services filed a motion to 
cease reunification with the father based on the aggravating factor of his 
conviction.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4002(1-B)(A)(1) 
(2017); 22 M.R.S. 
§ 4041(2)(A-2)(1) (2017).  In November 2016, the mother, who is the child’s 
legal custodian, see 22 M.R.S. § 4002(5) (2017), filed a petition to terminate the 
father’s parental rights to the child.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4052(1) (2017).2  In 
April 2017, the court held a hearing on all pending matters: the petition for 
child protection; the petition to terminate the father’s parental rights; and the 
Department’s motion to cease reunification with the father.    
[¶3]  By order dated July 14, 2017, the court granted the Department’s 
motion to cease reunification with the father and terminated the father’s 
                                         
1  Title 17-A M.R.S. § 255-A(1)(M) (2017) provides that “[a] person is guilty of unlawful sexual 
contact if the actor intentionally subjects another person to any sexual contact and . . . [t]he other 
person is in fact less than 18 years of age and the actor is a parent, stepparent, foster parent, guardian 
or other similar person responsible for the long-term general care and welfare of that other person.”  
 
2  Although not required by 22 M.R.S. § 4052(1) (2017), the termination petition was a 
three-party petition.  Compare 22 M.R.S. § 4032(1)(C) (2017), with 22 M.R.S. § 4052(1).  
 
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parental rights.  After the court entered judgment, the father appealed the 
court’s termination of his parental rights.  He primarily argued that the court 
misapplied the rebuttable presumption contained in 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1-A)(A), 
(B)(8) by shifting the evidentiary burden to the father in contravention of our 
August 2017 opinion in In re Evelyn A., which held that “a court may reach an 
ultimate finding of unfitness only if the evidence in its entirety supports that 
finding by clear and convincing evidence” and that the parent whose rights are 
at stake has “neither a burden of production nor a burden of persuasion or 
proof regarding the ‘presumption’ addressed in section 4055(1-A).”  2017 ME 
182, ¶¶ 31-32, 169 A.3d 914.  Because In re Evelyn A. was published after the 
hearing and the entry of judgment in this case, we granted a stay pending 
further trial court action.  After reconsideration of the testimony and evidence 
presented during the April 2017 hearing, the court issued an amended 
judgment dated October 31, 2017, terminating the father’s parental rights.    
[¶4]  The court, in its amended judgment, found the following facts, which 
are supported by competent record evidence:  
The father is incarcerated and is under probation conditions 
that prohibit contact with children. . . .  
. . . . 
 
 
4 
Respondent-father was convicted of Unlawful Sexual 
Contact, Class C, on February 9, 2016. . . .   
 
The victim of the father’s crime was the daughter of his 
live-in partner.  The father was in a stepparent role for that child at 
that time.  The father touched that child’s vagina on multiple 
occasions when the child was between six and eight years old.  The 
Court finds this conduct to be heinous and abhorrent to society.  
 
. . . .  
 
In February, 2017, the father completed six months of 
voluntary sex offender treatment called cognitive-behavioral 
interventions for sex offenders.  This treatment was offered . . . by 
the Department of Corrections (DOC).  This treatment does not 
require offenders to admit the sexual abuse.  The six-month 
duration of the treatment is much different from the three-year sex 
offender treatment program offered at other facilities in DOC or to 
probationers in the community.  In addition to being six times 
longer, that program requires offenders to admit to sexual abuse.  
When the father started the treatment, the DOC administered the 
STATIC-99 assessment, which placed the father at moderate to 
high risk for re-offense.  By the time the father completed the 
treatment, the DOC had adopted the policy of administering a 
dynamic risk assessment, the Sex Offender Treatment Intervention 
and Progress Scale, at both ends of the treatment.  The father’s 
score on that assessment placed him at low risk for re-offense.  The 
shift in risk assessment tools means that the Court would be 
comparing apples to oranges if it tried to draw conclusions about 
the father’s actual progress in treatment.  The father was not 
responsible for the shift in risk assessment tools.   
 
Regardless of the utility of the risk assessment results, the 
Court finds that the father’s voluntary engagement in the only 
treatment available, given his short two-year sentence, is better 
than nothing.  The treatment fails, however, to alleviate the Court’s 
concern that [the child] would be subject to a threat of sexual abuse 
or exploitation by her father, and that threat constitutes jeopardy.   
 
5 
 
The Court also finds that the father’s substance abuse and 
mental health history poses jeopardy to the child.  Prior to his 
incarceration, the father abused amphetamines and opiates.  He 
has suffered from serious anxiety and depression.  It would take 
treatment and measurable stability and health to alleviate that 
jeopardy.    
 
If everything goes well for the father—he gets released from 
prison this fall, starts the three-year sex offender treatment, as well 
as mental health and substance abuse treatment, and successfully 
completes it—[the child] will then be the same age as the known 
victim of the father’s sexual abuse.  The father will be on probation 
for four years after his release, with one of the conditions being no 
contact with children under 18. . . .  The Court finds that jeopardy 
cannot possibly be alleviated within four-and-a-half years.   
 
 
 
. . . . 
 
 
Respondent-father’s custody of [the child] has been removed 
by an order of this Court . . . under the authority in 19-A M.R.S. 
§ 1653. . . .  
 
Turning to the question of unfitness, the Court finds by clear 
and convincing evidence that respondent-father is unfit to parent 
[the child] by virtue of his being unable to protect her from 
jeopardy and unable to take responsibility for her in a time 
reasonably calculated to meet her needs.   
 
. . . .  
 
. . .  Father’s counsel ably elicited testimony from the father’s 
prison-based counselor that he was at moderate to high risk for 
re-offense before a six-month stint of sex offender treatment and at 
low risk afterwards.  The Court is not able to give that testimony 
great weight, for reasons discussed above.  However, the Court 
would not be persuaded of father’s fitness to parent even by a 
statistically valid risk assessment comparison.  The Court finds that 
 
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the father has much more work to do, by any measure, to alleviate 
the risks posed by his history of sexual abuse, substance abuse, and 
mental health struggles.    
 
. . . .  
 
[The child] was born on November 5, 2013.  Her parents 
were then living together.  The investigation into the father’s sexual 
abuse of the other child began in March of 2014.  In May of 2014, 
[the Department] filed a child protection petition and [the mother] 
moved to her mother’s home with [the child].  On August 7, 2014, 
the Court entered an interim order granting to the mother sole 
parental rights and responsibilities and to the father supervised 
visitation. . . .  The father has not seen [the child] since he was 
incarcerated.  
 
The Court draws from this evidence the reasonable 
inferences that [the child’s] primary attachment is with her mother.  
[The child’s] only opportunity to form a secure attachment with the 
father ended more than three years ago.  [The child’s] ability to 
integrate into the father’s home . . . would be the same as her ability 
to integrate into the home of a stranger.  It would be stressful for 
[the child]. . . .  
 
. . . .  
 
The [guardian ad litem] believes that termination of the 
respondent-father’s rights to [the child] is in the child’s best 
interest.  Based upon the clear and convincing evidence, the Court 
agrees.   
 
 
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We now consider the father’s timely appeal.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4006 (2017); M.R. 
App. P. 2 (Tower 2016).3   
II.  DISCUSSION 
[¶5]  Although the father challenges the court’s application of the 
rebuttable presumption contained in 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1-A)(A), (B)(8), he no 
longer argues that the court improperly shifted the burden to him to rebut the 
presumption.  Instead, the father argues that because there is evidence in the 
record to show that he has made progress through services offered by the 
Department of Corrections, the court’s unfitness findings are not supported by 
sufficient evidence.  He also challenges the court’s finding that termination is in 
the best interest of the child.  Reviewed for clear error, there is competent 
evidence to support both the court’s unfitness findings and its finding that 
termination of the father’s parental rights is in the child’s best interest.  See In re 
Logan M., 2017 ME 23, ¶ 3, 155 A.3d 430.   
A. 
Unfitness  
[¶6]  In its amended judgment, the court determined that its factual 
findings regarding the father’s conduct and conviction created “a permissible 
                                         
3  Although the amended judgment in this case was entered after September 1, 2017, the restyled 
rules do not apply because the father’s notice of appeal was filed before September 1, 2017.  See M.R. 
App. P. 1.   
 
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inference of unfitness” pursuant to 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1-A)(A), (B)(8), which 
provides, 
1-A.  Rebuttable presumption.  The court may presume 
that the parent is unwilling or unable to protect the child from 
jeopardy and these circumstances are unlikely to change within a 
time which is reasonably calculated to meet the child’s needs if: 
 
A.  The parent has acted toward a child in a manner that is 
heinous or abhorrent to society . . . .  
 
B.  The victim of any of the following crimes was a child for 
whom the parent was responsible or the victim was a child 
who was a member of the household lived in or frequented 
by the parent and the parent has been convicted of:  
 
 
 . . . .  
 
 
(8)  Sexual abuse of minors. 
 
We have recently concluded that this “rebuttable presumption” does not permit 
the shifting of any burden to the parent.  See In re Evelyn A., 2017 ME 182, 
¶¶ 24-33, 169 A.3d 914.  Rather, it “is analogous to a permissive inference in 
criminal cases, where the fact-finder is entitled to reach a certain conclusion 
based on a specified factual predicate.”  In re Addilyn R., 2017 ME 236, ¶ 4, 
176 A.3d 184. 
[¶7]  Here, although the court found that it could permissibly make an 
inference of unfitness, it nonetheless carefully considered In re Evelyn A., 
2017 ME 182, 169 A.3d 914, in its analysis and stated that before it could make 
 
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any ultimate unfitness findings, it “must decide whether to infer from the 
father’s conviction and all other evidence presented at the termination hearing” 
that the father was, in fact, unfit.  (Emphasis added.)  And although “the court 
invoked the evidentiary analysis allowed by” the statute, “the judgment 
demonstrates that the court treated that statute as the pathway to an inference, 
and placed the burden of proof entirely on the [petitioner] and did not require 
or expect the [father] to meet any evidentiary burden.”  In re Addilyn R., 
2017 ME 236, ¶ 4, 176 A.3d 184.    
[¶8]  It is clear from the record that the father has successfully engaged 
in some services during his incarceration.  Regardless, viewing the evidence in 
its entirety, there is competent evidence to support the court’s findings that 
(1) the father is unable to protect the child from jeopardy, and that is unlikely 
to change in a time which is reasonably calculated to meet the child’s needs, and 
(2) the father is unable to take responsibility for the child in a time which is 
reasonably 
calculated 
to 
meet 
her 
needs. 
 
See 
22 
M.R.S. 
§ 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i)-(ii).   
B. 
Best Interest 
[¶9]  The father additionally contends that there is insufficient evidence 
to support the court’s finding that termination is in the best interest of the child.  
 
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Contrary to that contention, sufficient record evidence exists—including 
sufficient record evidence to support the court’s finding that the child’s 
opportunity to form a secure attachment with the father ended more than three 
years ago and its finding that any future integration into the father’s home 
would be akin to integrating into the home of a stranger—to support the court’s 
determination that termination of the father’s parental rights is in the child’s 
best interest.  See In re Tyrel L., 2017 ME 212, ¶ 15, 172 A.3d 916; see also 
22 M.R.S. § 4055(2) (2017); In re Jacob B., 2008 ME 168, ¶ 14, 959 A.2d 734.   
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Richard Charest, Esq., Lewiston, for appellant father 
 
Lorne Fairbanks, Esq., Lewiston, for appellee petitioners 
 
 
Lewiston District Court docket number PC-2016-62 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY