Filed 6/26/13 Evan A. v. Super. Ct. CA5 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
FIFTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

EVAN A., Petitioner,

v.
THE SUPERIOR COURT OF STANISLAUS COUNTY, Respondent;

STANISLAUS COUNTY COMMUNITY SERVICES AGENCY, Real Party in Interest. F067039
(Super. Ct. Nos. 516358 & 516379)

O P I N I O N

THE COURT  ORIGINAL PROCEEDINGS; petition for ex traordinary writ review. Ann Q. Ameral, Judge.
Nadine Salim for Petitioner. No appearance for Respondent. John P. Doering, County Counsel, and Robin Gozzo, Deputy County Counsel, for Real Party in Interest.
-ooOoo-

 Before Cornell, Acting P.J., Gomes, J., and Peña, J.2 Evan A. seeks extrao rdinary writ review from the juven ile court’s orders issued at a contested six-month review hearing (W elf. & Inst. Code, § 366.21, subd. (e)) 1
, terminating his reunification services and sett ing a section 366.26 hearing as to his twoyear-old daughter, Evangeline, and nine-month-old son, Patric k. (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.452.) Evan contends he regularly par ticipated and made substantial progress in his
reunification services. Therefor e, he further contends, the juvenile court should have
continued his services rather than terminate them. We conclude substantial evidence supports the juvenile court’s order termina ting Evan’s reunification services and deny the petition.
PROCEDURAL AND FACTUAL SUMMARY Evan and R.H. (mother) 2 are the parents of Evangeline and Patrick, the subjects of this writ petition. Mother also has a four-year-old daught er, Maddison. Evan and mother have histories of drug abuse. Evan has an extensive criminal history involving use, possessi on and sale of drugs, burgla ry, and parole and probation violations. His drug of c hoice is methamphetamine. These dependenc y proceedings were initiated in July 2012 when the Stanislaus County Community Services Ag ency (agency) took then th ree-year-old Maddison and 18-month-old Evangeline into protective cust ody after family maintenance services proved ineffective. At the time, mother was pregnant w ith Patrick and Evan was in violation of his parole. The agency placed Maddison and Evangeline with their maternal grandmother. In July 2012, th e agency filed a dependency petition seekin g Maddison and Evangeline’s removal. That same month, the juvenile court ordered them detained. Evan

1 All further statutory references are to the Welfare and Institutions Code.
2 Mother did not file a writ petition

.3 and mother appeared at the detention hearin g and were appointed counsel. The juvenile court set a jurisdictional/dispositional hearing for late August 2012. Meanwhile, mother was referred for resi dential drug treatment but declined. In early August 2012, she gave birth to Patrick at 34 weeks’ gestation. The agency took him into protective custody at the hospital and f iled a dependency petition on his behalf. The juvenile court ordered him detained and se t his jurisdictional/dispositional hearing to coincide with that of his siblings. In August 2012, Ev an and mother entered drug treatment. She entered Nirvana Women of Hope (Nirvana), an inpatient drug treatment facility . Evan entered residential drug treatment at Seventh Step Foundation, In c. (Seventh Step) as a requirement of his parole. The jurisdictional/dispositional hear ing was continued and conducted in September 2012. The juvenile court exerci sed its dependency ju risdiction and ordered reunification services, which for Evan in cluded counseling, a domestic violence assessment, inpatient substance abuse treatment, and random dr ug testing. The juvenile court set the six-month review hearing for Ma rch 2013 and advised Evan and mother that
it could terminate their reunification services at that time if they did not make significant
progress. In early November 2012, Evan relapsed and was discharged from Seventh Step. He did not contact the agency after his discha rge. He appeared, however, at the hospital in December where mother was being treated fo r a bacterial infection. According to her primary counselor, who was present in the room, Evan appeared to be under the
influence. The counselor told mother she was not allowed to be around Evan and asked him to leave. He did so despite mother’s begg ing him to stay. As a result of this incident as well as prior infractions, mother was discharged from Nirvana.4 In early January 2 013, mother reentered Nirvana bu t was discharged again at the end of the month for lying about calling her sponsor. By that tim e, she and Evan had
conceived another child. The staff at Nirvana advised the agency mother’s “chance of sustaining long term recovery [was] minima l” because of her dishonesty, lack of motivation to change, and con tinuing relationship with Evan. Two days before mother was discharged from Nirvana, Evan entered C.U.R.A., Inc., a six-month residential treatment program. In late February 2013, mo ther completed a substance abuse assessment and tested positive for methamphetamine. She denied us ing the drug but a hair follicle test
confirmed the result. In March 2013, the agency filed its report for the six-month review hearing and recommended the juvenile court terminate Ev an and mother’s reunification services because they had not fully ad dressed the issues that led to the children’s removal from
their care. The juvenile court set a contested heari ng in March 2013. The agency submitted a letter from C.U.R.A. stating Evan exhibited “remarkable improvement” and intended to complete their long-term residential program. The staff asked the court to allow Evan to have supervised visits with all three children at the facility. In March 2013, the juvenile court c onvened the contested six-month review hearing. County counsel made an offer of proof that the social worker would testify mother began attending individual parenting sessions in mid-March 2013 and Evan was doing well at C.U.R.A. He a ttended general education studies , process groups and anger management groups, and drug te sted with negative results. According to the staff at C.U.R.A., Evan would probably require a full year of treatment at C.U.R.A. The juvenile court accepted the offer of proof.5 Mother testified she did not complete a ny component of her reunification plan.
She was told she could reente r Nirvana in early April. She intended to maintain her relationship with Evan because she did not believe it was de trimental to her but would leave him if he was unable to maintain sobriety. Jeffrey Ponce from C.U.R.A. testifie d Evan was in the 90-day in-custody treatment program through the parole departme nt but Evan wanted to stay longer. He said the average stay was nine months to a ye ar. He said Evan ha d been in the program approximately two months and after 90 days, Evan could participate in parenting and
domestic violence classes. He said Evan was in a very structured program and that the substance abuse treatment component was “[p]retty extensive.” Evan testified he had difficulty mainta ining sobriety at Se venth Step because “everybody was using in the program.” He re lapsed and left the program in November. After he left Seventh Step, a warrant was issu ed for his arrest. In mid-January 2013, he turned himself into the police and was placed in C.U.R.A. He did not try to get into a program sooner because he was “using.” While at Seventh Step, Evan visited the ch ildren weekly. He last saw the children
in December. Since he had been in C.U.R.A ., he spoke to the children on the telephone
four or five times. The owner of C.U.R.A. said she would ma ke visits available for Evan at the facility and he had already begun th e process of requesting visits there. Evan testified his parole ended in Decembe r 2013. He planned to finish the 90 days required by parole and extend his trea tment another two months. After that, he was willing to look for clean and sober housing wh ere he could have the children stay with him. He was also willing to stay at C. U.R.A. for nine to 12 months, if that was
recommended.6 Evan said he was in a relationship with mo ther but was not “with her.” He wanted her to work on her recovery and attain sobrie ty so that they could be a family but was willing to discontinue their relati onship if she did not succeed. Evan testified he used “street drugs” on and off for 25 years. He also completed drug treatment at Nirvana in 2010 and Allied Fellowship in 2003, both required by parole. He had not been out of custody fo r more than a year since 2001 or 2002.
Evan believed the treatment he received at C.U.R.A. was more effective than the treatment he previously received because th e program at C.U.R.A. was structured and helped him address his behaviors. At the conclusion of the hearing, the j uvenile court found mother made minimal progress and that Evan’s progress was fair. The court further found they did not make substantive progress in resolvin g the issues that required th e children’s removal and there was not a substantial probability the children could be returned to their custody with continued services. Consequently, the juve nile court terminated their reunification
services and set a s ection 366.26 hearing. This petition ensued.
DISCUSSION
Evan contends there is insu fficient evidence to support th e juvenile court’s finding he failed to regularly participate and make substantive progress in his reunification services. Therefore, he further contends, the juvenile court should be ordered to vacate
the section 366.26 heari ng and order that reunification se rvices continue. We disagree. Section 366.21, subdivision (e) governs th e proceedings at the six-month review hearing. Under subdivision (e), the juvenile court may terminate reunification services
and schedule a section 366.26 hearing if, as here, the child was under the age of three at the time of the initial removal and the juve nile court finds by clear and convincing evidence “the parent failed to participate re gularly and make substantive progress in a court-ordered treatment plan ....” (§ 366.21, subd. (e).)7 We review the juvenile court’s finding Evan failed to regularly participate and make substantive progress in his case plan for substan tial evidence. ( Jennifer A. v. Superior Court (2004) 117 Cal.App.4th 1322, 1341.) In so doing, we do not reweigh the
evidence but review the entire record in the light most fa vorable to the juvenile court’s finding to determine if substan tial evidence supports it. ( A.A. v. Superior Court (2012) 209 Cal.App.4th 237, 242.) Here, the juvenile court found Evan made “fair” progress in his court-ordered reunification plan. Evan contends the findi ng is error because the juvenile court improperly focused on his relapse rather than his progress in “internalizing his sobriety.” In essence, Evan asks this c ourt to reweigh the evidence. However, as stated above, that is not our role. Rather, our role is to dete rmine whether substantial evidence supports the juvenile court’s finding. In this case, we conclude that it does. Evan had six months to demonstrate progre ss in his services plan of which drug treatment was a chief component. Howe ver, approximately six weeks into the reunification period, he relapsed. He subseq uently evaded the authorities for two and a half months all the while continuing to use drugs. According to the record, this was Evan’s pattern which he repeated several times in the previous 11 to 12 years. Given Evan’s extensive drug history a nd pattern of relapse, it is little wonder the juvenile court found he made fair progress despite having comp leted two months of drug treatment. We affirm the juven ile court’s finding Evan failed to make substantive progress in
his court-ordered services. We also affi rm its orders termin ating his reunification services and setting a section 366. 26 hearing and deny the petition.
DISPOSITION The petition for extraordinary wr it is denied. This opinion is final forthwith as to
this court.