Title: IN THE MATTER OF THE TERMINATION OF PARENTAL RIGHTS TO CW and CW, minor children: LJC V. HMW; IN THE MATTER OF THE ADOPTION OF CW and CW, minor children: TLC and LJC V. HMW

State: wyoming

Issuer: Wyoming Supreme Court

Document:

IN THE MATTER OF THE TERMINATION OF PARENTAL RIGHTS TO CW and CW, minor children: LJC V. HMW; IN THE MATTER OF THE ADOPTION OF CW and CW, minor children: TLC and LJC V. HMW2008 WY 50182 P.3d 501Case Number: S-07-0157, S-07-0158Decided: 04/30/2008
APRIL TERM, A.D. 2008

 
 
IN THE MATTER OF 
THE TERMINATION OF PARENTAL RIGHTS TO CW and CW, minor children: 
LJC,

 
 
Appellant

(Petitioner),

 
 
v.

 
 
HMW,

 
 
Appellee

(Respondent).

 
 
IN THE MATTER OF 
THE ADOPTION OF CW and CW, minor children: TLC and LJC,

 
 
Appellants

(Petitioners),

 
 
v.

 
 
HMW,

 
 
Appellee

(Respondent).

 
 
Appeal 
from the District Court of Uinta County

The 
Honorable Dennis L. Sanderson, Judge

 
 
Representing 
Appellants:

John A. 
Thomas, Evanston, Wyoming.

 
 
Representing 
Appellee:

Farrah 
L. Spencer, Harris Law Firm, PC, Evanston, Wyoming.

 
 
Guardian 
Ad Litem (S-07-0158):

            
Geoffrey James Phillips, Phillips Law, PC, Evanston, 
Wyoming.

 
 
Before VOIGT, C.J., and GOLDEN, 
HILL, KITE, and BURKE, JJ.

 
 
BURKE, 
Justice.

 
 

[¶1]           
LJC 
("Mother") and HMW ("Father") are the biological parents of CW1, born in 1998, 
and CW2, born in 2000.  Mother and 
Father never married.  In 2002, 
Mother married TLC ("Husband").  In 
these two consolidated appeals, Mother and Husband challenge the district 
court's denial of their petition to adopt the two children, and Mother 
challenges the district court's denial of her petition to terminate Father's 
parental rights.  We will affirm the 
district court's decisions.

 
 
ISSUES

 
 

[¶2]           
Mother 
and Husband raise these two issues:

 
 
1.         
Whether the district court abused its discretion and misapplied the law 
in denying the petition for adoption?

 
 

2.                  
Whether 
the district court abused its discretion and misapplied the law in denying the 
petition for termination of parental rights?

 
 
FACTS

 
 

[¶3]           
It is 
undisputed that Mother and Father are the biological parents of two children, 
CW1 and CW2.  When CW1 was born in 
1998, Father was unemployed due to a disability.  He helped care for CW1, along with 
Mother's other children.  Father was 
able to begin working again in 2000.  
CW2 was born a short time later.  
Mother and Father finally ended their relationship in 2002.  

 

[¶4]           
Father 
visited the children several times after the relationship ended, but the last 
time he saw them was on Thanksgiving of 2002, approximately a month after Mother 
married Husband.  Father called 
again on Christmas of 2002, and asked to take the children for the morning.  Mother refused on the basis of short 
notice, but offered that he could take them in the afternoon.  He did not.  During 2003, Father relates, he called 
Mother's home more than thirty times to talk to the children.  His efforts were largely unsuccessful, 
and he apparently spoke to CW1 on the telephone only once during 2003.  In short, Father has had very limited 
contact with his children after Mother and Husband were 
married.

 
 

[¶5]           
It is 
also clear that Father contributed little in the way of financial support for 
the children.  He provided a vehicle 
for Mother's use for a period following their separation.  He may have maintained health insurance 
coverage for the children, though the record suggests that this insurance lapsed 
at some time during 2006.  Father 
has never paid any money to Mother for child support.

 
 

[¶6]           
This 
litigation commenced in June 2005, when Father filed a petition to establish his 
paternity of the two children.  
Father also asked the district court to set up a visitation schedule, and 
to set the amount he should pay for child support.  Mother and Husband countered with a 
petition to adopt the children.  
Nearly a year later, Mother also filed a petition to terminate Father's 
parental rights.

 
 

[¶7]           
The 
district court consolidated the three matters, and held a hearing on them in 
December 2006.  In April 2007, it 
entered two separate orders, one denying the petition by Mother and Husband to 
adopt the children, and another denying Mother's petition to terminate Father's 
parental rights.  In August 2007, 
the district court entered a third order, affirming Father's paternity and 
establishing a visitation schedule and child support payments.  Mother and Husband appeal the denial of 
their petition for adoption in Docket Number S-07-0158.  Mother appeals the denial of her 
petition to terminate Father's parental rights in Docket Number S-07-0157.  

 
 
DISCUSSION

 
 
Denial 
of Petition for Adoption

 
 

[¶8]           
"The 
power to grant or deny a petition for adoption is within the discretion of the 
trial court."  In re Adoption of CF, 2005 WY 118, ¶ 
10, 120 P.3d 992, 998 (Wyo. 2005).  
We review the district court's decision for abuse of discretion.  In re Adoption of JRH, 2006 WY 89, 
¶ 13, 138 P.3d 683, 686 (Wyo. 2006).  
The district court may grant an adoption without parental consent 
"provided all the statutory elements are satisfied."  CF, ¶ 10, 120 P.3d  at 998.  However, "because the right to associate 
with one's child is a fundamental right protected by the Wyoming and United 
States Constitutions, adoption statutes are strictly construed when the 
proceeding is against a nonconsenting parent, and every reasonable intendment is 
made in favor of that parent's claims."  
JRH, ¶ 13, 138 P.3d  at 
686.  The party requesting an 
adoption therefore "bears the burden of proving the existence of at least one of 
the statutory factors by clear and convincing evidence."  CF, ¶ 11, 120 P.3d  at 
999.

 
 

[¶9]           
Mother 
and Husband rely on two statutes in their petition to adopt the children.  We start with Wyo. Stat. Ann. 
§ 1-22-110, which establishes when a district court may grant an adoption 
without the consent of a parent.  It 
states, in relevant part, that:

 
 
[T]he 
adoption of a child may be ordered without the written consent of a parent . . . 
if the court finds that . . . the nonconsenting parent or parents have: 

 
 
            
. . . 

 
 
(iv)  Willfully failed to contribute to the 
support of the child for a period of one (1) year immediately prior to the 
filing of the petition to adopt and has failed to bring the support obligation 
current within sixty (60) days after service of the petition to adopt.  

 
 
Wyo. 
Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) (LexisNexis 2007).  Father did not pay child support for a 
period exceeding one year prior to the filing of the adoption petition.  He did not bring his child support 
payments current after the petition was served.  The difficulty faced by the district 
court, however, was that Father had never been ordered to make any child support 
payments.  Accordingly, the district 
court ruled "that because of the absence of a defined child support obligation 
and the duty of the Court to strictly construe the statutes against terminating 
a non-consenting parent's rights, the adoption cannot be granted."  The district court also found that "it 
was impossible for [Father] to bring the child support current' because it was 
impossible to state the amount of the obligation."

 
 

[¶10]       
Mother 
and Husband assert that Father was obligated to pay child support despite the 
lack of any court order to do so.  
Mother and Husband point out that Wyoming recognizes a common law duty of 
child support.  See, e.g., Warren v. Hart, 747 P.2d 511, 514 (Wyo. 
1987) ("[E]ven if the divorce decree does not mandate support by a parent for 
the children, the absence of decree provision does not eliminate the intrinsic 
obligation.").  They also cite 
another statutory provision, Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(ix), which 
authorizes a court to approve an adoption without the consent of a parent if 
that parent has "[w]illfully failed to pay a total dollar amount of at least 
seventy percent (70%) of the court ordered support for a period 
of two (2) years or more."  
(Emphasis added.)  Because 
this statutory section explicitly mentions court-ordered support, while Wyo. 
Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) does not, Mother and Husband argue that the 
latter statutory provision implicitly indicates that a parent has an obligation 
to pay child support even if not subject to a court order.

 
 

[¶11]       
Further, 
Mother and Husband strongly rely on In re 
Adoption of GAR, 810 P.2d 113 (Wyo. 1991) to assert that Father's failure to 
pay child support, despite the lack of a court order, provides grounds to 
approve an adoption without his consent.  
In GAR, the biological parents 
of four children got a divorce, and the decree specified that the father "shall 
be responsible for child support."  
810 P.2d  at 114.  The decree 
did not specify any amount, however, at least in part because the district court 
did not have personal jurisdiction over the father at the time the divorce was 
granted.  After the mother 
remarried, she and her husband petitioned to adopt the four children.  The father objected, arguing that no 
child support amount was specified in the divorce decree, so that his failure to 
make any child support payments was not a willful failure to support his 
children.  We rejected his argument, 
saying it "overlooks the obligation for parental support of minor children which 
exists absent a court ordered duty to do so."  Id. at 115.  We held that the father had a duty to 
contribute to the support of his minor children, court order or no, and that his 
failure to satisfy that obligation provided grounds for the district court to 
approve an adoption without the father's consent.

 
 

[¶12]       
We agree 
with Mother and Husband that, as in GAR, Father in the present case had a 
child support obligation even without a court order.  As in GAR, Father here failed to meet that 
obligation in any substantial way.  
However, there are two differences between GAR and the present case.  First, after GAR was decided in 1991, the legislature 
amended Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) by adding the provision that an 
adoption may be granted over the objection of a parent if that parent "has 
failed to bring the support obligation current within sixty (60) days after 
service of the petition to adopt."  
1992 Wyo. Sess. Laws ch. 84, § 1.  The new statutory language does not 
excuse a parent from child support payments absent a court order, but as the 
district court observed, it is impossible to determine if the parent has brought 
the support obligation current unless the amount of that obligation has been 
established.  Second, the mother in 
GAR had asked the father for child 
support payments, and he had refused.  
In contrast, Father in the present case asked the court to establish 
child support payments in his petition to establish 
paternity.

 

[¶13]       
In a 
case with factual circumstances similar to the current case, we said 
that:

 
 
This 
situation may be distinguished from prior cases where we held that a willful 
failure to support existed.  For 
example, in GAR, the Mother 
specifically asked the nonconsenting putative father for assistance, which the 
father denied.  GAR, 810 P.2d  at 118-119.  In [In re] Adoption of CCT, 640 P.2d 73, 74 
[(Wyo. 1982)], the father was under a court order to provide support.  In this case, there was no request for 
assistance, nor was there a court order identifying Mother's contribution.  We do not, by this decision, abandon the 
principal that every parent has a duty to contribute to the support of his or 
her child, whether ordered by a court or not.  GAR, 810 P.2d  at 115.  In fact, we reaffirm it.  However, we do not find clear and 
convincing evidence that Mother willfully failed to financially contribute to 
the support of the child in this case, and, therefore, we will not disturb the 
ruling of the district court.  

 
 

In re 
Adoption of SMR, 982 P.2d 1246, 1250 (Wyo. 1999) (emphasis, internal citations, and 
punctuation different from original).  We also reaffirm that every parent has a 
duty to contribute to the support of his or her child, with or without a court 
order.  Under the circumstances of 
this case, however, we will not disturb the district court's ruling that Father 
had not willfully failed to make child support payments or to bring them 
current.

 
 

[¶14]       
Most 
significantly, we note that the statute provides that "the adoption of a child 
may be ordered without the written 
consent of a parent" if the court finds that the parent willfully failed to make 
child support payments and to bring them current.  Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) 
(emphasis added).  We have commonly 
said that the word "may" in a statute "clearly indicates permissive 
authority."  Billings v. Wyoming Bd. of Outfitters & 
Guides, 2001 WY 81, ¶ 37, 30 P.3d 557, 571 (Wyo. 2001).  Accordingly, even if the district court 
had concluded that one or more of the statutory factors had been met, it was 
still not required to order the adoption if it found other valid grounds for 
denying it.  The other grounds 
relied upon by the district court were the best interests of the children. 

 
 

[¶15]       
In the 
second statutory provision we consider, Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-108, the 
best interests of the children are factors for the district court to consider 
when deciding whether to grant a petition for adoption.  This statute states, in relevant 
part:

 
 
If the 
putative father files and serves his objections to the petition to adopt . . . 
and appears at the hearing to acknowledge his paternity of the child, the court 
shall hear the evidence in support of the petition to adopt and in support of 
the objection to the petition and shall then determine 
whether:

 
 
(i)  The putative father's claim to paternity 
of the child is established; 

 
 
(ii)  The putative father having knowledge of 
the birth or pending birth of the child has evidenced an interest in and 
responsibility for the child within thirty (30) days after receiving notice of 
the pending birth or birth of the child; 

 
 
(iii)  The putative father's objections to the 
petition to adopt are valid; and 

 
 
(iv)  The best interests and welfare of the 
child will be served by granting the putative father's claim to paternity or by 
allowing the petition to adopt.

 
 
Wyo. 
Stat. Ann. § 1-22-108(c).  

 
 

[¶16]       
The 
parties vigorously disagree about the best interests of the children.  The record supports the claim of Mother 
and Husband that they have provided CW1 and CW2 with a good home and a stable 
environment.  On the other hand, the 
district court noted other facts indicating that the best interests of the 
children would be served by preserving their relationship with Father.  Specifically, the district court found 
that: 

 
 
if the 
adoption is granted, the children will be deprived of the financial support that 
is due them from their natural father, and as the guardian ad litem noted, the 
children will be denied the opportunity of knowing their genetic father.  Moreover, the ties developed between the 
adoptive father and the children will not be severed if the adoption is not 
granted.

 
 
The 
district court's decision letter demonstrates that it carefully weighed the 
conflicting evidence about the best interests of the children.  It properly construed the law in favor 
of Father, and correctly noted that Mother and Husband had to support their 
petition for adoption with clear and convincing evidence.  Thus, even though the district court 
found it "more probable than not that it is in the best interests of the 
children that the adoption be granted," it ultimately concluded that it was not 
clearly convinced that the adoption would be in the best interests of the 
children.  We find no abuse of 
discretion in the district court's decision to deny the petition for 
adoption.

 
 
Denial 
of Petition for Termination of Parental Rights

 
 

[¶17]       
The 
second of these consolidated appeals involves Mother's petition to terminate 
Father's parental rights pursuant to Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 14-2-309.  We have previously held that "the 
adoption statutes control over the more general provisions found in the 
paternity statutes."  In re Adoption of BGH, 930 P.2d 371, 375 
(Wyo. 1996).  Because the decision 
is "controlled by the adoption statutes and is not impacted by the statutes 
relating to paternity," analysis under the paternity statutes is "inapt."  Id.  With the petition for adoption pending, 
the district court would have been justified in dismissing Mother's petition to 
terminate Father's parental rights.  
However, because the district court denied the adoption, its further 
decision to deny Mother's petition to terminate Father's parental rights worked 
no prejudice against Mother.  On 
that basis, we summarily affirm the district court's decision not to terminate 
Father's parental rights.