Opinion ID: 6345135
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Failure to Comply with Service Plan

Text: We first address Father’s assertion that the evidence is legally insufficient to support termination under Subsection (O), which applies when a parent “failed to comply with the provisions of a court order that specifically established the actions necessary for the parent to obtain the return of the child who has been in the permanent or temporary managing conservatorship of the Department . . . for not less than nine months as a result of the child’s removal from the parent under Chapter 262 for the abuse or neglect of the child.” Id. § 161.001(b)(1)(O). Father does not dispute that J.W. has been in the temporary managing conservatorship of the Department for not less than nine months as the result of his removal under Chapter 262. Nor does Father assert that the trial court’s order incorporating the family service plan did not specifically establish the actions necessary for him to obtain J.W.’s return. Rather, Father contends that the Department “relied on things that were not actually part of his service plan to show noncompliance.” As discussed, Father completed several of his service-plan requirements, including establishing paternity, submitting to random drug testing, signing releases of records, maintaining a steady income, completing a parenting assessment, attending visits with J.W., and attending counseling. But he did not, according to the Department, “maintain a safe and stable home environment” or contact the Department at least twice a month. On the record before us, we agree with the Department that a reasonable juror could have formed a firm 23 belief or conviction that Father failed to maintain a safe and stable home environment and thus failed to comply with the service plan. 8 Beginning with the condition of Father’s home, which the Department visited shortly after J.W. was removed and again a few months before trial, two caseworkers testified in detail that the home was unsafe and unsuitable for a child. That testimony and the accompanying photographic evidence are described above, and, again, Father made no effort at trial to refute it. Instead, Father asserts that the Department was well aware of Father’s plan to live elsewhere with J.W.—rendering the condition of his home “irrelevant” 9—and gave him no indication that it disapproved of his plan. Nor, Father asserts, did any Department witnesses testify that they thought Father was untruthful about his intentions. Father characterizes the evidence as demonstrating that he had a concrete plan for raising J.W. in a stable environment and that the Department secretly and subjectively determined that the plan was insufficient. The Department responds that the requirement to maintain a safe and stable home was not a prospective one and that at the time of trial, the intended safe and stable home “simply did not exist.” The Department further contends that the jury was free to disbelieve Father’s testimony that he intended to move out of the home in which he had resided for forty years or “to infer that 8 We need not address the parties’ dispute about whether Father maintained insufficient contact with the Department.