Opinion ID: 172351
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Family-Integrity Claim

Text: The Starkeys contend that Defendants violated their substantive-due-process rights to family integrity by depriving Mr. and Mrs. Starkey of custody and contact with the children. [T]he Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment protects the fundamental right of parents to make decisions concerning the care, custody, and control of their children. Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57, 66, 120 S.Ct. 2054, 147 L.Ed.2d 49 (2000). See J.B. v. Washington County, 127 F.3d 919, 927 (10th Cir.1997) ([The] right of familial association [of plaintiffs, a mother and child,] is included in the substantive due process right of freedom of intimate association....). But this right to family integrity has never been deemed absolute or unqualified. Martinez v. Mafchir, 35 F.3d 1486, 1490 (10th Cir.1994). Courts have recognized that the constitutional right to familial integrity is amorphous and always must be balanced against the governmental interest involved. Id. We need not resolve the dispute between the parties regarding whether the government's interest in the welfare of the children outweighed the Starkeys' rights to family integrity. We are persuaded by Defendants' alternative defense that if there was any interference with the Starkeys' constitutional rights, Defendants did not cause it. They correctly assert that [t]he [state] court made every significant decision about custody, visitation and treatment. Aplee. Br. at 21. The Starkeys do not contest that the evidence presented to the state court was sufficient to justify the court orders removing custody and limiting contact. Rather, they contend that the orders were entered based upon the knowingly false statements made by Defendants to caregivers, which were then repeated as hearsay to the court. Aplt. Br. at 17. In other words, they claim that the court orders were fraudulently induced by Defendants. We will assume for purposes of this appeal that it would be a constitutional violation for Defendants to have obtained the state-court orders through the presentation of fabricated evidence. Cf. Malik v. Arapahoe County Dept. of Soc. Servs., 191 F.3d 1306, 1316 (10th Cir.1999) (government officials' procurement of court order to seize a child `through distortion, misrepresentation, and omission' was a violation of the Fourth Amendment). The evidence relied upon by the Starkeys, however, does not create a genuine issue that the state court's decisions were based on evidence knowingly falsified by Defendants. Four separate court proceedings are at issue: (1) on August 25, 2004, the state court ordered that legal custody of the children be placed with BCDSS and that Mr. Starkey have only supervised contact with the children; (2) a year later, on September 9, 2005, the state court ordered that temporary custody of the children be placed with Ms. Kozlowski and that Mr. Starkey have only supervised contact with the children; (3) on September 12, 2005, the state court affirmed its order placing the children in the temporary custody of Ms. Kozlowski and limited the contact of both Mr. and Mrs. Starkey; and (4) on September 21, 2005, the state court ordered that custody of A.B. be placed with BCDSS. It is not clear from the Starkeys' briefing whether they allege that Defendants obtained the first order, in August 2004, through fraudulent means. They do allege that Defendants knew that the children's allegations about their father were false. But there is no evidence that Defendants had received any information that the children had made false allegations about their father until the children recanted some of their allegations in May 2005, nine months after the first order. The Starkeys have directed us to no evidence in the record that Defendants fabricated evidence to obtain this first order. The Starkeys allege that the remaining three orders, which were entered in September 2005, were obtained only because Defendants invented a claim that Mr. Starkey had subjected A.B. to a coercive `spiritual cleansing' that resulted in her hospitalization. Aplt. Br. at 3-4. According to the Starkeys, Defendants provided this false information to the children's caretakers, who then repeated it through their testimony to the court. In support of these allegations, the Starkeys direct us to (1) Dr. Stackpool's September 12 testimony (as described by the Starkeys) that A.B. had a history of emotional abuse by her father, that she had just returned [to his home] after a ten-month hiatus, and [that] she had just been subjected to a `spiritual cleansing' [by her father], id. at 4; (2) a notation in A.B.'s discharge report from Ft. Logan that states: At the time of admission, the patient's social worker expressed deep concern that during the patient's stay at her father's, that she had been `brain washed' religiously by her father who apparently started his own church a number of years ago and is very heavily into religion, Aplt.App. Vol. I at 46; and (3) Hamilton's testimony at the September 21 hearing that she had received secondhand information from a caseworker that it was Mr. Starkey's fault that A.B. ended up in the hospital, id. Vol. IV at 488-89. [2] The statements upon which the Starkeys rely contain seven factual assertions: (1) that Mr. Starkey had a history of emotionally abusing the children; (2) that A.B.'s hospitalization occurred immediately after her first unsupervised visit with Mr. Starkey in ten months; (3) that A.B. had been subjected to a spiritual cleansing by Mr. Starkey; (4) that A.B. had been brainwashed by Mr. Starkey; (5) that Mr. Starkey started his own church; (6) that Mr. Starkey was heavily into religion; and (7) that A.B.'s hospitalization was caused by Mr. Starkey. For one of these assertions to support the Starkeys' claim that the court's orders were caused by Defendants' concoction of false evidence, the Starkeys would have to prove (1) that the assertion was false, (2) that Defendants were the source of the assertion, (3) that Defendants knew the assertion to be false, and (4) that the state court relied on the assertion in rendering one of its orders. As we now proceed to show, none of the assertions satisfies all four conditions. Two of the seven assertions (numbers 5 and 6) are not contestable, or at least not contested by the Starkeys. That Mr. Starkey was heavily into religion, id. Vol. I at 46, is established by the Starkeys' briefs on appeal, as well as by the record. As for the assertion that Mr. Starkey started his own church a number of years ago, id., Mr. Starkey testified on direct examination during the September 12 hearing that he and Mrs. Starkey had worship service[s] in their home. Id. Vol. III at 376. The children's guardian ad litem pursued the matter in the following exchange: Q: Mr. Starkey, I want to talk about the religious environment in your home. In fact, there's a church in your basement; is that correct? A: I have no basement. Q: Okay. Where you have service at your house? A: Yes. Q: And when the children are there, they participate in the service, correct? A: No. Q: They do not? A: Nope. Q: How many memhow many individuals do you have in the congregation? A: I no longer have any members in my congregation. In the Q: You indicated A: past Q: earlier in your testimony that you do not speak as a pastor, that Bedra speaks? A: Yes, I have been preaching outside of my home for the past year in other men's churches. Court: I'm sorry, in other what? A: Other men's churches. I'm a back-upI'm a back-up pastor and preacher to the Denver Rescue Mission. Court: Oh. Q: So who does Bedra speak to? A: Since we haven't had any members for quite some time, she preaches to me. Q: Outside of the presence of the children? A: The children haven't been home. For the last five weeks, they have not participated because they are not there on Sunday nights. So theythey have only beenwell, it's been over a year. Id. at 410-11. Mr. Starkey has not specifically denied that he started his own church, and his testimony certainly suggests that he did so. As for assertions 1 and 4, the Starkeys have failed to present evidence that Defendants concocted the allegations that Mr. Starkey had a history of emotionally abusing the children or that he had brainwashed them. The children reported physical and emotional abuse to BCDSS in August 2004. Although the children later claimed that their initial allegations against their father had been exaggerated, they did not fully recant. Moreover, Mr. Starkey pleaded no contest to criminal charges of child abuse stemming from the children's allegations in 2004. And Dr. Pinto's evaluation in October 2004 stated that Mr. Starkey was an abusive individual, both physically, emotionally and spiritually. Aplt.App. Vol. II at 234. Perhaps Mr. Starkey did not emotionally abuse his children, but the evidence in the record could not support a finding that any Defendant knowingly made a false charge of such abuse. The same can be said with respect to the brainwashing assertion. The only evidence that any Defendant alleged that Mr. Starkey had brainwashed the children appears in A.B.'s discharge report from Ft. Logan on September 21, 2005. But before A.B.'s admission to Ft. Logan, Kintzing had substantial information that would support such an allegation: Ms. Kozlowski told Kintzing that Mr. Starkey had religiously brain abu[sed] the children in the past, id. Vol. I at 83. Also, the West Pines counselor reported to Kintzing that Ms. Kozlowski had told him that Mr. Starkey had a church in his home, and that A.B. was prayed over for 2-3 hours on the 7th of September, id., and that he was concerned that A.B. had a brainwashing dynamic goin[g] on, id. This record cannot support the Starkeys' assertion that Defendants fabricated the allegation that A.B. had been brainwashed by her father. Turning to assertions 2 and 3, the Starkeys have presented no evidence that Defendants were the source of the (inaccurate) statements that A.B. had her first unsupervised visit with her father immediately before her hospitalization and that Mr. Starkey had subjected her to a spiritual cleansing. These inaccurate statements were made by Dr. Stackpool in his testimony on September 12, 2005. The Starkeys contend that Dr. Stackpool testified that he did not know the source of [these] allegations, but that they would not have come from the child's birth mother. Aplt. Br. at 4. The record is to the contrary. Dr. Stackpool testified that he treated A.B. upon her admission to the emergency department, that a West Pines counselor evaluated her outside his presence, and that he learned from that counselor that A.B. had just had her first unsupervised visit with Mr. Starkey in ten months, during which she had been subjected to a spiritual cleansing by her father. Aplt. App. Vol. III at 319. Dr. Stackpool said that he did not know the source of the counselor's information, but he assumed that the counselor obtained it from A.B. or Ms. Kozlowski. Kintzing did not learn of A.B.'s hospitalization until Ms. Kozlowski called her the following morning. Nothing suggests that any Defendant was the source of Dr. Stackpool's misinformation, directly or indirectly. (We also note that the factual errors in Dr. Stackpool's testimony were corrected during the Starkeys' later presentation of their case at the same hearing. Mr. Starkey testified that joint custody had begun several weeks before A.B.'s hospitalization; and Pastor Walker testified that the spiritual cleansing had occurred at Victory Church, id. at 352, and that Mr. Starkey was not directly involved.) One assertion (number 7) remainsthat Mr. Starkey caused A.B.'s hospitalization. The only evidence that any BCDSS employee made such an assertion was elicited during the Starkeys' cross-examination of Hamilton, the psychiatric nurse who testified at the final hearing, on September 21, 2005. The Starkeys' attorney asked Hamilton whether A.B. had ever told somebody else something that would indicate that it was her father's responsibility that she had ended up in the hospital. Id. at 488. Hamilton responded that she had heard secondhand information about that from her caseworker. Id. at 488-49. The Starkeys' attorney did not have Hamilton expand on this point. Such vague testimony cannot support a claim that a Defendant alleged that Mr. Starkey caused her hospitalization. Moreover, and perhaps more importantly, the Starkeys have failed to show that any false information from Defendants influenced the state court in issuing the various orders that interfered with the Starkeys' family integrity. To begin with, the Starkeys have utterly failed to show what evidence and argument, if any, was presented to the state court on September 9, 2005, when the court ordered that temporary custody of the children be placed with Ms. Kozlowski and that Mr. Starkey have only supervised contact with them. As for the September 12 order, which affirmed placement of the children in the temporary custody of Ms. Kozlowski and limited their contact with Mr. and Mrs. Starkey, we have a transcript of the proceedings, but nothing suggests that false information from Defendants played a role. Dr. Stackpool's opinion was based on his observations of A.B. at the hospitalthat she was tearful, babbling, and focused on Hurricane Katrinaand on the information that he learned from the West Pines counselor (none of which can be traced to a BCDSS employee). Furthermore, there is no evidence that Dr. Stackpool's opinion was anything other than his own, independent conclusion. As for the factual errors in Dr. Stackpool's testimony (regarding when Mr. Starkey had begun having unsupervised visits and whether he participated in the spiritual cleansing), they were corrected later in the proceeding; it would be pure speculation to say that they affected the court. The other expert who testified at the hearing, Dr. Konlos-Hrobsky, based her opinion on her observations of E.F. a month before A.B.'s hospitalization. She testified about E.F.'s disturbed emotional state after Mr. Starkey had shown him an Internet site that mentioned fatalities caused by medication used to treat attention deficit disorder. There is no evidence to support an inference that she was influenced by an allegation or opinion stated by BCDSS personnel. Finally, the state-court order on September 21, placing A.B. in the custody of BCDSS, was based on the expert testimony of Mary Hamilton, a psychiatric nurse at Ft. Logan, who was the only witness to testify at the hearing. Her opinion was clearly based on her daily meetings with A.B., not on reports by BCDSS. And her opinions made no reference to the matters that are the source of the Starkeys' allegations. She testified that the chaos in A.B.'s family was overwhelming to [A.B.], and that, over the course of ten days, A.B. had expressed a desire to be placed with her mother, with her father, and in foster care. Id. Vol. IV at 481. Hamilton noted that A.B.'s disorganized thinking and level of stress h[ad] decreased quite a bit during her time at Ft. Logan, id. at 479, but she concluded that it would be most appropriate for her to go to foster placement, id. at 483. She doubted the wisdom of placing A.B. with either parent: My concern would be that she would get right back into not taking care of herself emotionally and trying to take care of both of her parents and I think when she does that, her level of stress goes up and she becomes very overwhelmed. And I think right now that, you know, we just got her stabilized and I think that if she was in a neutral place for a period of time, that that would allow her to become even more stable and kind of sort through some issues. Id. at 484. The state court relied on Hamilton's testimony when explaining its decision. After noting that A.B. had changed her mind three times about where she wants to be during her stay at Ft. Logan, id. at 516, the court concluded that it would be in A.B.'s best interests to be placed in foster care: A.B. needs to take care of herself. She needs to get well. She needs to be removed from the chaos.... She needs to get off of the roller coaster ride. She needs to feel safe and stable so that she can work on things that 14-year-old kids work on. Not on taking care of your parents because they have a really high conflict divorce. She needs to be 14 and we need to get her there. Id. at 518. On this record, the Starkeys have not shown that anything a Defendant may have reported had any effect on Hamilton's testimony or on the state court's order. In sum, the Starkeys have failed to raise a genuine issue that the state-court orders were fraudulently induced by Defendants. Accordingly, we affirm the summary judgment for the individual Defendants in their personal capacities on the Starkeys' family-integrity claim.