Opinion ID: 1540750
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: The Child's Right to Counsel

Text: The issue of whether § 5-323 mandates the appointment of separate counsel for a child where the termination of a natural parent's singular right is sought in a contested independent adoption proceeding was neither raised nor decided in any of the trial court proceedings below. As earlier indicated, the matter was raised for the first time before the in banc panel, which stated that failure to appoint separate counsel for Baby G. violated § 5-323, but noted that subsequent to the trial proceedings Baby G. had obtained separate counsel to represent his interests and that they had been well represented. Ernest's appeal to the Court of Special Appeals did not raise as an issue the matter of appointment of counsel for Baby G. The question was, however, raised again in the D.'s certiorari petition. Maryland Rule 8-131(a) provides that this Court [o]rdinarily ... will not decide any [non-jurisdictional] issue unless it plainly appears by the record to have been raised in or decided by the trial court, but the Court may decide such an issue if necessary or desirable to guide the trial court or to avoid the expense and delay of another appeal. As to the failure to raise the issue in the trial court, we shall hold, as we did in similar circumstances in Wash. Co. Dep't Soc. Serv. v. Clark, 296 Md. 190, 200, 461 A.2d 1077 (1983), that where, as here, the person for whose protection the statute was enacted is too young to have raised the issue in the absence of counsel, we may, in our discretion, address the issue. In the circumstances of this case, we choose to do so. In Clark, supra, 296 Md. at 199-200, 461 A.2d 1077, we held that the failure to appoint counsel to represent the children of the appellee, whose parental rights the State sought to terminate under then Art. 16, § 76 of the Maryland Code, violated § 77B(a)(4) of that Article requiring the appointment of counsel for the child. This latter section was recodified without substantive change as present § 5-323(a)(4) of the Family Law Article, governing the appointment of counsel in termination of parental rights proceedings. There is no merit in Ernest's contention that § 5-323(a)(4)'s mandate that counsel be appointed, in an involuntary termination of parental rights, to represent an individual who is a subject of the proceeding applies only to a proceeding brought under § 5-313 [3] and is not applicable to independent adoption proceedings brought under § 5-312. Ernest's position is unsupported by any reference to the statutory history of § 5-323 or its precursor, § 77B. The cardinal rule of statutory construction is to determine the true intent of the legislature. Condon v. State, 332 Md. 481, 491, 632 A.2d 753 (1993). We look first to the plain meaning of the language of the statute. Id. A plainly worded statute must be construed without forced interpretations designed to limit its application. Tucker v. Fireman's Fund Ins. Co., 308 Md. 69, 73, 517 A.2d 730 (1986). Section 5-323 provides that in a proceeding for an adoption or guardianship, separate counsel shall be appointed in an involuntary termination of parental rights. The statute contains no language that would limit its application to only those proceedings brought under § 5-313. Moreover, both §§ 5-312 and 5-313 make explicit reference to a termination of parental rights. [4] Both set forth conditions prerequisite to the termination of parental rights and provide authority for the termination of rights once these conditions have been satisfied; thus, both sections govern termination actions. As we see it, for the purposes of § 5-323's applicability, there is no difference between a termination of parental rights prerequisite to the granting of an independent adoption and a termination of parental rights prerequisite to the granting of an agency-arranged adoption. In each instance, a parent's rights are irrevocably extinguished. See Joan H. Hollinger et al., Adoption Law and Practice § 4.04(1) (1993) (if an adoption can be granted without the natural parent's consent, and if the effect of the adoption is to terminate all legal rights and relationships between the child and the natural parent, the adoption proceeding is also a proceeding for termination of parental rights). Manifestly, the need for independent counsel to represent the interest of the child is just as compelling in an independent adoption as in an agency-initiated proceeding. Because § 5-323 mandates [5] the appointment of counsel to represent Baby G. in the circumstances of this case, the trial court should have so ordered. [6]