Title: In re Child of Kenneth S.

State: maine

Issuer: Maine Supreme Court

Document:

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions
Decision: 
2022 ME 14 
Docket: 
Wal-21-203 
Submitted 
On Briefs: December 21, 2021 
Decided: 
February 17, 2022 
Panel: 
STANFILL, C.J., and MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, HORTON, and CONNORS, JJ. 
IN RE CHILD OF KENNETH S. 
JABAR, J. 
[¶1] In this consolidated appeal, the father challenges the termination of
his parental rights as to his child entered in the District Court.  (Belfast, 
Worth, A.R.J.).  The mother raises an appeal conditioned on our vacating the 
District Court’s termination of the father’s parental rights.1  We affirm the 
judgment as to both parents. 
I.  BACKGROUND 
[¶2]  The facts are drawn from the court’s findings, which were entered 
after a five-day consolidated hearing and are supported by competent record 
evidence.  See In re Children of Michelle C., 2021 ME 61, ¶ 2, 264 A.3d 1221. 
1  The mother argues that, if we were to vacate the trial court’s termination of parental rights to 
the father based on any of his challenges, it would not be in the child’s best interest to terminate her 
rights.  Because we affirm the order terminating the father’s parental rights, we need not reach this 
argument.  Additionally, as discussed below, the trial court’s determinations as to parental unfitness 
of the mother and best interest of the child were supported by competent record evidence.   
 
2 
[¶3]  Shortly after the child was born in 2010, the father was granted sole 
parental rights and responsibilities and primary residence of the child, and the 
mother’s contact was limited to supervised visits.2  Prior to 2018, the father had 
sought mental health treatment for the child because the child was often 
dysregulated in his emotions and actions.  In March 2018, police performed a 
welfare check on the child’s residence and found the child locked in his room.  
In an interview, the child stated that his father dragged him up the stairs by the 
hood of his sweatshirt and locked him in his room.  The father was charged with 
domestic violence assault related to this incident and was prohibited from 
having contact with the child.3  Pursuant to a safety plan between the father and 
the Department of Health and Human Services, the child was placed with his 
maternal grandparents but remained in the father’s custody.   
[¶4]  After the child had several behavioral incidents in April and 
May 2018, and after healthcare and educational professionals had difficulty 
engaging with the father, the father asked the Department to take custody of 
the child.  On May 15, 2018, the Department filed a petition for child protection
2  Between 2010 and 2018, the Department of Health and Human Services investigated the parents 
several times due to its concern about the parents’ ability to care for the child but never opened a 
case.   
3  This charge was later dismissed pursuant to a plea agreement where the father pleaded guilty 
to disorderly conduct and was ordered to pay a fine.   
3 
that included a request for a preliminary protection order.  The court 
(Mathews, J.) granted the Department custody of the child that same day.  The 
Department continued the child’s placement with the maternal grandparents.   
[¶5]  On August 16, 2018, the court (Fowle, J.) entered a jeopardy order, 
by agreement, as to each parent.  The order as to the father stated that the father 
caused the child to be in circumstances of jeopardy due to the threat of physical
and emotional harm and the deprivation of needed medical care.  The order as 
to the mother stated that the mother posed “the threat of injury and the 
deprivation of adequate supervision and care.”   
[¶6]  On December 4, 2019, the Department filed a petition to terminate
the parental rights of both parents.  On March 9, 2020, the father filed a motion 
to continue the termination hearing, and, on March 12, the father’s attorney 
moved for leave to withdraw; the court (Davis, J.) granted both motions.  The
father requested a new attorney.  He claimed that his attorney was to delete 
certain portions of the agreed-to jeopardy order, by agreement with the state, 
and had failed to move the court to amend the order to reflect those deletions.  
The court appointed a new attorney on March 16, 2020.  Following several
further continuances, the petition was eventually heard over five days, almost 
a year later, on January 25, March 30, April 1, May 21, and May 24, 2021.   
 
4 
[¶7]  At the close of the hearing, the court (Worth, A.R.J.), made no findings 
or indication of its decision, instead stating that it was going to review the 
exhibits and statutes and write a decision “as quickly as [it could].”  The court,
then, through a clerk, via email, notified all parties that it was requesting a 
proposed order and findings only from the Department.  The father filed a
memorandum objecting to the court’s request and “propose[d] that no parties
provide any proposed orders and findings or that all parties provide proposed 
orders and findings.” The court denied the father’s objection stating that it “had 
ample opportunity to understand [the father’s] positions taken, and his likely 
proposed findings and conclusions.”  The court received the proposed order 
and findings from the Department on June 9, 2021.   
[¶8]  On June 14, 2021, the court entered its termination order, finding 
that the parents were unwilling or unable to protect the child from jeopardy or 
take responsibility for the child in a time reasonably calculated to meet the 
child’s needs and that termination was in the child’s best interest.  See 22 M.R.S.
§ 4055(1)(B)(2)(a), (b)(i)-(ii) (2021). 
[¶9]  The court found the father unfit based on the child’s high needs, the 
father’s own mental health needs, the father’s erratic therapy attendance, the 
father’s claim that he was in therapy only because the Department demanded 
5 
it, the Department’s need to suspend visits because of the inappropriate 
interactions between the father and the child that upset the child to the point 
where the child no longer wanted to attend visits, and the father’s continual 
denial of the inappropriateness of his actions that caused the need for the 
Department’s involvement.   
[¶10] The court found the mother unfit based on her significant health
needs that had occasionally led to her being hospitalized, and because, since 
April 2019, she had seen the child only while supervised.  The mother had 
declined to have more frequent visits with the child and had stated that she did
not believe that she could parent the child on a regular basis.   
[¶11]  The court found that the child’s well-being had improved since he
began living with his grandparents.  The child also expressed his desire to stay 
with his grandparents.   
[¶12]  Both parents timely appealed.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4006 (2021); M.R. 
App. P. 2B(c)(1).   
[¶13]  On July 2, 2021, the father also filed a motion for relief from the 
judgment, alleging ineffective assistance of counsel by the father’s first 
attorney.4  M.R. Civ. P. 60(b).  On October 20, 2021, the court (Martin, J.), denied 
4  On August 20, 2021, we permitted the trial court to act on the father’s motion for relief.   
 
6 
the father’s motion, stating that the father had failed to make a prima facie 
showing of ineffective assistance of counsel and that the motion was untimely 
filed.   
II.  DISCUSSION 
[¶14]  On appeal, the father raises three arguments.  He argues that the 
court erred by denying his request to submit a proposed order while allowing
the Department to submit a proposed order, and such an error amounted to the 
denial of a closing argument and violated his procedural due process rights.  He 
also argues that the trial court used language in its order that inappropriately 
shifted the burden of persuasion to the father.5  Finally, he argues that his 
attorneys provided ineffective assistance of counsel, necessitating remand.  
A. 
Due Process 
[¶15]  The father contends that the court was required to allow him to 
present a proposed order and that the court’s failure to allow him to present 
5  This argument, based on the court’s imprecise use of language, is unpersuasive, and does not 
warrant extended discussion.  A review of the decision as a whole demonstrates that the court 
properly placed the burden of persuasion on the Department.  The burden remains on the 
Department at all times to prove parental unfitness by clear and convincing evidence.  See, e.g., In re
Forest G., 2017 ME 26, ¶ 4, 155 A.3d 879. 
7 
proposed findings while requesting that the Department present a proposed
order and findings was a violation of due process.6  
[¶16]  The state must use procedures that align with due process 
requirements when terminating parental rights.  In re C.P., 2016 ME 18, ¶ 17, 
132 A.3d 174.  This requirement allows for “an opportunity to be heard upon
such notice and proceedings as are adequate to safeguard the right which the 
particular pertinent constitutional provision purports to protect.”  In re
Alexander D., 1998 ME 207, ¶ 13, 716 A.2d 222 (quotation marks omitted).  
Courts determine if there has been a due process violation based on  
(1) the private interest that will be affected by the government’s 
action; (2) the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such an interest 
through the existing procedure and the probable utility of 
additional or substitute procedural safeguards; and (3) the 
government’s interest in adhering to the existing procedure, 
including the fiscal and administrative burdens that additional 
procedures might entail.
Id. (quotation marks omitted).  We “review de novo whether an individual was 
afforded procedural due process.”  In re Children of Benjamin M, 2019 ME 147, 
¶ 8, 216 A.3d 901. 
6  The father also contends that not allowing him to submit a proposed order is akin to not allowing 
him to make a closing argument.  However, even if we equate a proposed order with a closing 
argument, there is no right to make or submit a closing argument in child protection proceedings.  
See In re M.B., 2013 ME 46, ¶¶ 26-29, 65 A.3d 1260 (holding that parents in a termination of parental 
rights proceeding “are not entitled to closing argument as a matter of right” (quotation marks 
omitted)). 
 
8 
[¶17]  When addressing a due process challenge, the first factor we 
consider is the private interest that will be affected by the court’s action.  The 
private interest at issue here involves the termination of a parent’s
constitutional right to raise his children, and we have held that “parents must 
be afforded the utmost in procedural protection when the state deprives them 
of their parental rights.” In re Chelsea C., 2005 ME 105, ¶ 11, 884 A.2d 97 (citing
Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U.S. 745, 753 (1982)).  This factor weighs heavily in 
favor of requiring a court to allow a parent to submit a proposed order and 
findings when allowing the Department to submit a proposed order and 
findings.  
[¶18]  The second factor involves a determination of whether the process 
adopted carries a “risk of an erroneous deprivation . . . and [of] the probable 
utility of additional or substitute procedural safeguards.”  In re Alexander D., 
1998 ME 207, ¶ 13, 716 A.2d 222 (quotation marks omitted).  At the conclusion 
of the hearing, the trial court did not render a decision.  Rather, it indicated that 
it would review the evidence and “write a decision as quickly as [it could].”  The
process the trial court used here—where only the Department was allowed to 
submit a proposed order—could have had a significant impact upon the court’s 
9 
decision.  The obvious procedural safeguard would have been to allow the 
father to submit a proposed order and findings. 
[¶19]  The third factor in a procedural due process analysis—the 
additional fiscal and administrative burden associated with adopting any extra 
procedural safeguards—also weighs in favor of the father.  Allowing the father 
to submit a proposed order and findings would have imposed a negligible
administrative burden on the court. 
[¶20]  After considering all the factors, we conclude that the trial court 
erred because its refusal to allow the father to submit a proposed order and 
findings while simultaneously requesting that the Department to submit a 
proposed order and findings involved a significant private interest and carried 
an inherent risk of an erroneous deprivation of his parental rights. 
[¶21]  When the court chooses to allow or request the submission of
proposed orders and findings or to allow oral argument, it may not extend the 
opportunity to one side and not the other.  If the court has yet to rule, a request 
for argument or a proposed order is in substance an invitation for advocacy, 
and the opportunity to advocate, if it is granted, must be extended equally.7  The
7  If the court’s request is made after the court has ruled, the request can be made of the prevailing 
party only, but good practice, if not due process, calls for the opposing party to be allowed to 
comment on whether the prevailing party’s submission accurately reflects the court’s ruling. 
 
10 
principle of equality of access to the courts is rooted in the Due Process Clause 
of the United States Constitution.  See Harrington v. Harrington, 269 A.2d 310, 
314 (Me. 1970) (“[E]qual access to the civil courts was among the Fourteenth 
Amendment’s primary objectives.”); U.S. Const. amend. XIV.  In this instance, 
given that the court had not yet ruled, the court should not have invited the 
Department to submit a proposed order without affording the father the same
opportunity.8 
[¶22]  Notwithstanding the trial court’s error, to assert a procedural due 
process error on appeal, a party must articulate an identifiable prejudice. 
The vacating of an order entered after a procedural error is not 
automatic.  To vacate such an order, this Court must determine 
that it was entered after a process that was “inconsistent with 
substantial justice.”  M.R. Civ. P. 61.  We have held that an 
appellant, to be successful, must demonstrate both error and 
prejudice resulting to the appellant from the claimed error. 
 
S. Me. Props. Co. v. Johnson, 1999 ME 37, ¶ 9, 724 A.2d 1255.  
[¶23]  Here, the court’s procedural error did not prejudice the father.  In 
terms of prejudicing a parent’s case, we have stated “[i]n termination cases, 
where fundamental interests are at stake, due process requires: notice of the 
issues, an opportunity to be heard, the right to introduce evidence and present 
8  We focus on the requirements of the U.S. Constitution because the father has based his appeal 
solely on a claim of a violation of the Due Process Clause of the U.S. Constitution.   
11 
witnesses, the right to respond to claims and evidence, and an impartial 
fact-finder.”  In re Child of James R., 2018 ME 50, ¶ 17, 182 A.3d 1252 (quotation 
marks omitted).  Here, the father had notice of the issues and had a five-day 
hearing where he testified and responded to the claims and evidence the 
Department presented against him.  The concern is whether the trial court, 
having access only to the Department’s proposed findings, could be an impartial
fact-finder.  The father does not challenge the court’s independent judgment, 
stating that “[t]his case has nothing to do with whether the trial court exercised 
its ‘judicial function’ or ‘independent judgment.’”  Even if this had been 
challenged, however, the record indicates that the court did exercise its 
independent judgment and did not adopt the Department’s proposed order 
verbatim.  See In re Marpheen C., 2002 ME 170, ¶ 7, 812 A.2d 972 (“[A] verbatim 
adoption of findings proposed by one party . . . is disfavored, as such an 
approach suggests that the court has not applied its independent judgment in
making its findings and conclusions.”).   
[¶24]  A review of the record indicates that the trial court’s decision to 
accept a proposed order and findings only from the Department did not affect
the outcome of the case.  
 
12 
[¶25]  The trial court identified two bases of parental unfitness as to the
parents—(1) their unwillingness or inability to protect the child from jeopardy 
and the unlikelihood these circumstances would change within a time 
reasonably calculated to meet the child’s needs and (2) their unwillingness or 
inability to take responsibility for the child within a time reasonably calculated 
to meet the child’s needs. 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i)-(ii). The court’s
findings with regard to the father’s unfitness were fully supported by the 
testimony presented during the trial that demonstrated, inter alia, that the 
father struggled to attend therapy, declined to engage with intensive outpatient 
therapy, did not engage in parenting classes despite urging from the 
Department, and had multiple inappropriate visits with the child.  The father
himself testified that he did not completely recognize that locking the child in
his room was inappropriate.  He also testified that he was attending therapy 
only because the Department required him to do so.  The court’s decision 
concerning the mother was supported by testimony that, during the period 
between the jeopardy hearing and the trial, the mother had been hospitalized 
several times due to her mental illness and had declined to expand visitation 
because she did not feel capable of being a mother.   
13 
[¶26]  With regard to the best interest of the child, the trial court’s 
conclusion was supported by testimony from school officials, social workers, 
therapists, and the father about the child’s extensive needs and the child’s 
improvements since living with his grandparents.  Notably, the mother agrees 
with the court’s determination on best interest, asserting, on appeal, that she
“believes it is in her child’s best interests that both parents’ rights be
terminated.”   
[¶27]  In summary, the trial court’s procedural error did not prejudice 
the father’s due process rights because the error did not affect the outcome of 
the case.  The record contains overwhelming evidence to support the court’s 
determinations that the parents were unfit and that termination of their rights 
was in the best interest of the child. 
B. 
Ineffective Assistance of Counsel 
[¶28]  The father also argues that his first attorney rendered ineffective 
assistance of counsel when he failed to delete certain portions of the initial 
jeopardy order, resulting in some facts being erroneously deemed admitted for 
future proceedings, and that his second attorney then failed to make a timely 
challenge to the jeopardy order based on the first attorney’s ineffective 
assistance.  When analyzing a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, we use
 
14 
the Strickland standard, which requires proof of deficient performance and 
resulting prejudice.  See Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984); 
In re M.P., 2015 ME 138, ¶¶ 23-27, 126 A.3d 718.  We have stated that the 
procedural requirements for a claim of ineffective assistance at the jeopardy 
stage are the same as those required at the termination-of-parental-rights 
stage. In re Child of Radience K., 2019 ME 73, ¶ 59, 208 A.3d 380.  These claims
can be raised on “direct appeal if the record already contains the basis for the 
claim.”  Id. ¶ 58.  We have emphasized that the “need for a swift resolution of 
ineffectiveness claims at the termination stage of child protection proceedings
applies just as forcefully at the jeopardy stage.”  Id. ¶ 59 (citation and quotation 
marks omitted). 
[¶29]  Although the initial jeopardy order was entered before our
decision in Radience K., either of the father’s attorneys could have raised the 
issues with the jeopardy order when Radience K. was published.  Because the 
father had specifically raised issues with how the first attorney had handled the 
jeopardy order when the father’s first attorney was replaced, the father’s 
second attorney was on notice of the issues.  That attorney failed to raise those 
issues until after the court terminated the father’s parental rights.  Although the 
father’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel concerning the jeopardy order 
15 
is not timely, we nonetheless address it in the context of the appeal from the 
order terminating his parental rights.9  
[¶30]  We begin our analysis by considering the second prong of the 
Strickland test, determining whether any potential deficient performance was 
prejudicial.  We review this prong by examining “whether [the] ineffective 
assistance of counsel rose to the level of compromising the reliability of the
judgment and undermining confidence in it.”  In re Children of Jeremy A., 2018 
ME 82, ¶ 21, 187 A.3d 602 (alteration and quotation marks omitted).  
Importantly, this appeal is a challenge to the termination of the father’s
parental rights, not to the jeopardy order or the court’s ruling on the father’s
Rule 60(b) motion.  Ultimately, while the father argues that there were several 
ways in which he was prejudiced, he fails to show how the court’s decision to 
terminate his parental rights was affected by his attorneys’ failure to move the
court to amend the jeopardy order, for at least two reasons.  First, it is unclear 
how much of the jeopardy order the father now disputes.  Second, while the 
trial court referred to the jeopardy order in its order terminating parental 
9  “To bring a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel . . . on direct appeal . . . the parent making 
the claim must submit a signed and sworn affidavit stating, with specificity, the basis for the claim.”  
In re M.P., 2015 ME 138, ¶ 21, 126 A.3d 718.  The father submitted a two-page affidavit with the 
appellant’s brief on October 12, 2021.   
 
16 
rights, it also relied on the testimony of numerous witnesses, including the 
father’s testimony and reports of events occurring in the almost three years 
between entry of the jeopardy order and the termination of parental rights 
hearing.  Nothing in the record indicates that any of the agreed-upon findings
at issue made any difference in the trial court’s decision to terminate his
parental rights. Because the father fails to show how changes to the jeopardy
order would have changed that outcome, the father fails to prove the second 
prong of the Strickland test, prejudice.  
[¶31]  Because we conclude that any potential ineffective assistance of 
counsel rendered by the father’s attorneys did not result in any prejudice to his
case, we do not address the first prong of the Strickland test, whether the 
assistance rendered to him was deficient.   
III.  CONCLUSION 
[¶32]  Although we conclude that the trial court erred by requesting and 
receiving a proposed order and findings only from the Department and 
rejecting the father’s request to submit a proposed order and findings, the 
father was not denied due process because he was not prejudiced by the trial 
court’s error.  Furthermore, the father failed to prove his claim of ineffective 
assistance of counsel. 
17 
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
Rory A. McNamara, Esq., Drake Law LLC, York, for appellant father
Joseph W. Baiungo, Esq., Belfast, for appellant mother 
Aaron M. Frey, Attorney General, and Hunter C. Umphrey, Asst. Atty. Gen., Office 
of the Attorney General, Augusta, for appellee Department of Health and Human 
Services 
Belfast District Court docket number PC-2018-11 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY