Title: In re Cameron B.

State: maine

Issuer: Maine Supreme Court

Document:

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT 
Reporter of Decisions 
Decision: 
2017 ME 18 
Docket: 
Han-16-264 
Submitted 
On Briefs: November 29, 2016 
Decided: 
January 26, 2017 
 
Panel: 
SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, MEAD, JABAR, HJELM, and HUMPHREY, JJ. 
 
 
IN RE CAMERON B. 
 
 
SAUFLEY, C.J. 
[¶1]  The mother and the father of Cameron B. appeal from a judgment of 
the District Court (Ellsworth, Roberts, J.) terminating their parental rights to the 
child pursuant to 22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(A)(1)(a) and (B)(2) (2016).  They 
contend that the court should have ordered a permanency guardianship 
instead of terminating their parental rights.  We affirm the judgment. 
I.  BACKGROUND 
[¶2]  In January 2014, when Cameron was ten months old, the 
Department of Health and Human Services filed a petition for a child protection 
order because of the parents’ neglect and the threat of neglect due to their 
substance abuse.  On February 3, 2014, the Department sought and obtained a 
preliminary protection order placing the child in the Department’s custody 
after the Department alleged that the child was found alone in a car with the 
 
2 
parents in contravention of a safety plan.  The child was placed in foster care 
with the father’s uncle and the uncle’s wife on the same day.   
[¶3]  By agreement, the court (Mallonee, J.) made a finding of jeopardy as 
to both parents based on their substance abuse.  A reunification plan required 
them to maintain sobriety, refrain from using non-prescribed mood-altering 
substances, and submit to random drug testing.   
[¶4]  After the court repeatedly, and unsuccessfully, ordered the parents 
to comply with drug testing requirements, the Department filed a petition to 
terminate their parental rights on May 19, 2015.  The court denied the petition 
on August 25, 2015, giving the parents additional time to recover from their 
addictions.  The court admonished the parents for failing to comply with drug 
testing and warned them that their continued failure to engage in recovery 
could result in future termination of their parental rights.   
[¶5]  On January 28, 2016, almost two years after Cameron was placed 
with his relatives, the Department filed a second petition for termination of the 
parents’ parental rights.  The Department alleged that, in addition to both 
parents’ substance abuse, neither was engaged in treatment, they had no stable 
housing, and they had made “little or no progress” in the five months that had 
elapsed after the first termination petition was denied.   
 
3 
[¶6]  The second termination hearing was held on April 26 and 29, 2016.  
The Department caseworker testified that the Department recommended 
termination because of the child’s young age and the risk that the parents would 
repeatedly bring the matter back into court.  The guardian ad litem (GAL) also 
recommended termination.  Although she believed that permanency 
guardianship could also provide permanency for Cameron, she expressed 
concern about “tension” between the parents and the foster parents.   
[¶7]  In a judgment entered on May 17, 2016, the court (Roberts, J.) 
terminated both parents’ parental rights to Cameron after making the following 
findings by clear and convincing evidence.  See In re Hannah S., 2016 ME 32, ¶ 3, 
133 A.3d 590.  The parents “continually failed” to comply with the drug testing 
requirement and never tested clean for a period of thirty days.  The Department 
requested drug tests from both parents on every weekday between January 22, 
2016, and March 3, 2016, but neither parent complied.  Permanency was 
important for the child.  The child had lived with his foster parents for twenty-
seven of the thirty-eight months of his life.  The foster parents provided “a 
loving and stable home” for him and they planned to adopt him.  The parents 
did not demonstrate a commitment to maintaining a sober lifestyle despite the 
passage of twenty-nine months.  The court further found that neither parent 
 
4 
was willing and able to protect the child from jeopardy, and those 
circumstances were unlikely to change within a time reasonably calculated to 
meet his needs, nor was either parent willing and able to take responsibility for 
the child within a time reasonably calculated to meet his needs.  See 22 M.R.S. 
§ 4055(1)(B)(2)(b)(i)-(ii).  To achieve permanency for the child, termination 
was in his best interest.  See id. § 4055(1)(B)(2)(a). 
[¶8]  Both parents appeal from the judgment.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4006 
(2016); M.R. App. P. 2(b)(3). 
II.  DISCUSSION 
 
[¶9]  The parents do not challenge the court’s factual findings regarding 
their lack of capacity for parenting.  Instead, they argue that the court erred in 
terminating their parental rights because the child was placed with relatives 
who live in the same town and who support visitation.  They contend that 
termination was not in the child’s best interest and that the court should have 
ordered a permanency guardianship instead.   
[¶10]  Before a court may terminate a parent’s parental rights, the court 
must find at least one ground of parental unfitness—which is uncontested here 
—and find, “by clear and convincing evidence . . . that termination is in the 
child’s best interest.”  In re C.P., 2016 ME 18, ¶ 30, 132 A.3d 174; see also 
 
5 
22 M.R.S. § 4055(1)(B).  We review the trial court’s factual findings for clear 
error and will reverse a finding only “if there is no competent evidence in the 
record to support it, if the fact-finder clearly misapprehends the meaning of the 
evidence, or if the finding is so contrary to the credible evidence that it does not 
represent the truth and right of the case.”  Guardianship of Hailey M., 2016 ME 
80, ¶ 15, 140 A.3d 478 (quotation marks omitted) (citations omitted).  The 
weight and credibility of the testimony and other evidence, including GAL 
reports, are for the fact-finder’s determination.  See In re I.S., 2015 ME 100, ¶ 11, 
121 A.3d 105. 
[¶11]  “With regard to the best interest determination, we review the 
court’s . . . ultimate conclusion for an abuse of discretion, viewing the facts, and 
the weight to be given them, through the trial court’s lens.”  In re M.B., 2013 ME 
46, ¶ 37, 65 A.3d 1260 (quotation marks omitted).  “The District Court’s 
judgment on the issue of best interest is entitled to substantial deference 
because that court is able to directly evaluate the testimony of the witnesses.”  
In re Michaela C., 2002 ME 159, ¶ 27, 809 A.2d 1245. 
[¶12]  As part of a permanency plan, a court may create a permanency 
guardianship to establish safe, long-term care for a child who is the subject of a 
child protection proceeding.  See 22 M.R.S. § 4038-C (2016).  When it is 
 
6 
appropriate, a permanency guardianship allows parents whose children cannot 
be returned to them to have a meaningful opportunity to maintain a legal 
relationship with their children and to have the court determine their rights to 
have contact with their children.  See id.  The question before the trial court was 
whether such an arrangement would serve Cameron’s best interest in the long 
term. 
[¶13]  By the time of the final hearing in this matter, three-year-old 
Cameron had been in foster care for more than two-thirds of his life.  His 
parents had demonstrated their inability and unwillingness to be meaningfully 
involved in his life.  To achieve permanency, he needed the certainty and 
stability of adoption.  The potential challenges to Cameron’s stable home and 
consistent parenting along with the possible costs and stress on his caretakers 
were appropriate for the court to consider.  The foster parents similarly needed 
clarity in their role.  Any tensions between them and the parents could have 
created further instability, and, again, were appropriate for the court to 
consider in this context.  Although there is no legal requirement for the foster 
parents to allow visitation in the future, solidifying their roles as legal parents 
may enable them to support the parents’ continuing to have sober visitation 
 
7 
with the child.1  The court did not err or abuse its discretion in determining that 
termination was in the best interest of the child. 
The entry is: 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Jeffrey C. Toothaker, Esq., Ellsworth, for appellant mother 
 
Charles Helfrich, Esq., Ellsworth, for appellant father 
 
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 
 
 
Ellsworth District Court docket number PC-2014-03 
FOR CLERK REFERENCE ONLY 
                                         
1  The foster mother testified that even if the parents’ rights were terminated, and she adopted the 
child, she intended to allow them to see him.