Title: In re Child of Nichole W.

State: maine

Issuer: Maine Supreme Court

Document:

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2019 ME 167 
Docket: 
Ken-19-291 
Submitted 
On Briefs: December 17, 2019 
Decided: 
December 19, 2019 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, and HUMPHREY, JJ. 
 
 
IN RE CHILD OF NICHOLE W. 
 
 
PER CURIAM 
[¶1]  Nichole W. appeals from a judgment of the District Court 
(Waterville, Stanfill, J.) terminating her parental rights to her child.1  See  
22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(A)(1)(a), (1)(B)(2)(a), (b)(i)-(iv) (2018).  The court did not 
err or abuse its discretion in terminating the mother’s parental rights, and we 
affirm the judgment. 
[¶2]  In January 2018, when the child was less than a month old, the 
Department of Health and Human Services filed a petition for a child protection 
order and requested a preliminary protection order because the mother had 
checked out of the hospital against medical advice and left her child at the 
hospital without arranging for the child’s care.  See 22 M.R.S. §§ 4032, 4034(1) 
                                         
1  As of the time that the mother’s parental rights were terminated, paternity of the child had not 
been established.  Service by publication was ordered on the same day that the termination order 
was entered.   
 
2 
(2018).  The court (Montgomery, J.) entered a preliminary protection order 
granting custody of the child to the Department.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4034(2) 
(2018).   
[¶3]  Although the mother was afforded the opportunity for a summary 
preliminary hearing, she did not appear.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4034(4) (2018).  Nor 
did she appear at the subsequent jeopardy hearing held in May 2018.2  See 
22 M.R.S. § 4035 (2018).  Based on the evidence presented at that hearing, the 
court (Stanfill, J.) found the child to be in circumstances of jeopardy because the 
mother had missed visits with the child, including at the hospital; had made 
poor decisions about her own health; and had experienced housing instability 
and domestic violence without participating in services to alleviate these 
circumstances.  The court ordered in late 2018 that the Department could cease 
reunification efforts with the mother because the mother had abandoned the 
child.   
[¶4]  The Department filed a petition for termination of the mother’s 
parental rights in April 2019.  Despite having notice of the July 2019 
termination hearing, the mother did not appear.  The court heard testimony 
                                         
2  Although the mother was present in the courthouse on that day, she was warned by a Judicial 
Marshal about her behavior and left the premises before the hearing began.   
 
3 
from the child’s foster mother, the Department caseworker assigned to the 
mother, the mother’s assigned community counseling caseworker, and the 
guardian ad litem.3  The court terminated the mother’s parental rights upon 
finding as follows: 
This case started [with] [the mother] having left the hospital . . . 
after giving birth and not seeing her newborn for a week.  She has 
a long history of housing instability, mental health issues, and 
remaining in domestically violent relationships.  The court has no 
evidence of any rehabilitation efforts, and it appears she remains 
without her own housing.  Most importantly, she has abandoned 
her daughter.  She has not seen her in well over a year and has no 
relationship with her.  [The child] deserves permanency.  She is 
thriving in her foster family.  It is in her best interest to be freed for 
adoption. 
 
 
[¶5]  The mother timely appealed from the judgment but has not raised 
any arguments on appeal.  Her counsel filed a brief, in accordance with the 
procedure outlined in In re M.C., 2014 ME 128, ¶ 7, 104 A.3d 139, indicating the 
absence of any arguable issue of merit, and he notified the mother that she 
could file a separate brief if she believed there was a valid ground for appeal 
and could request the appointment of new counsel if she desired new 
representation.  We entered an order authorizing the mother to file a separate 
                                         
3  Although the guardian ad litem’s final report and three other previous reports were not 
admitted at trial, see 22 M.R.S. § 4005(1)(D) (2018), the court’s findings are fully supported by 
witness testimony and the reports of the guardian ad litem that were properly admitted in evidence.   
 
4 
brief by October 17, 2019, but the mother did not do so.  We granted the 
Department's motion to consider this appeal on the mother's brief without 
briefing from the Department.   
[¶6]  If a court finds multiple bases for parental unfitness, “we will affirm 
if any one of the alternative bases is supported by clear and convincing 
evidence.”  In re M.B., 2013 ME 46, ¶ 37, 65 A.3d 1260.  Here, the court found 
the mother unfit based on all four grounds of unfitness, see 22 M.R.S. 
§ 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i)-(iv), and the evidence is sufficient to support all of those 
grounds, including abandonment.4  See 22 M.R.S. § 4002(1-A) (2018).  The 
evidentiary record further supports the court’s determination that termination 
of the mother’s parental rights is in the best interest of the child, who, by the 
time the judgment was entered, had spent the first year and a half of her young 
life in foster care.  See id. § 4055(1)(B)(2)(a).  We affirm the court’s 
well-supported judgment. 
 
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
                                         
4  The other bases for termination are that the mother 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,” she “has been unwilling or unable to take responsibility for the 
child within a time which is reasonably calculated to meet the child’s needs,” and she “has failed to 
make a good faith effort to rehabilitate and reunify with the child pursuant to section 4041.”  22 M.R.S. 
§ 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i), (ii), (iv). 
 
5 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Christopher S. Berryment, Esq., Mexico, for appellant Mother 
 
With leave of the Court, the Department of Health and Human Services did not 
file a brief 
 
 
Waterville District Court docket number PC-2018-3 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY