Court Opinion

ID: 9894986
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-03 19:12:22.980975+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:18.274458
License: Public Domain

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF APPEALS OF WEST VIRGINIA

                                    September 2023 Term                      FILED
                                     _______________                     November 3, 2023
                                                                              released at 3:00 p.m.
                                                                          EDYTHE NASH GAISER, CLERK
                                       No. 21-0766                        SUPREME COURT OF APPEALS
                                                                               OF WEST VIRGINIA
                                     _______________

                          IN RE ADOPTION OF R.L.
       ____________________________________________________________

                    Appeal from the Circuit Court of Wayne County
                          The Honorable Jason J. Fry, Judge
                              Case No. CC-50-2021-A-15

                        REVERSED AND REMANDED
                            WITH DIRECTIONS
       ____________________________________________________________

                             Submitted: September 6, 2023
                               Filed: November 3, 2023

Noel M. Olivero, Esq.                              Respondent Father J.L.
Sammons, Olivero & Paraschos                       Self-represented Litigant
Huntington, West Virginia
Counsel for Petitioner Stepfather
C.S. and Petitioner Mother E.S.

JUSTICE WOOTON delivered the Opinion of the Court.
                             SYLLABUS BY THE COURT

              1.     “‘In reviewing challenges to the findings and conclusions of the

circuit court, we apply a two-prong deferential standard of review. We review the final

order and the ultimate disposition under an abuse of discretion standard, and we review the

circuit court’s underlying factual findings under a clearly erroneous standard. Questions

of law are subject to a de novo review.’ Syllabus point 2, Walker v. West Virginia Ethics

Commission, 201 W.Va. 108, 492 S.E.2d 167 (1997).” Syl. Pt. 1, In re Adoption of Jon L.,

218 W. Va. 489, 625 S.E.2d 251 (2005).

              2.     The language of West Virginia Code section 48-22-306(a)(2) (2015)

requiring a birth parent to “visit or otherwise communicate with the child when he or she

knows where the child resides” does not preclude a finding that a birth parent has

abandoned a child when the evidence shows that the birth parent had the ability to ascertain

knowledge of the child’s whereabouts but chose not to do so.

                                             i
WOOTON, Justice:

                Petitioner Mother E.S. 1 and Petitioner Stepfather C.S. (collectively

“Petitioners”) appeal the order of the Circuit Court of Wayne County, West Virginia,

denying their petition to allow Petitioner Stepfather to adopt the minor child, R.L. 2

Respondent Father J.L., the child’s biological father, contested the adoption, thus requiring

the circuit court to analyze whether Respondent Father abandoned R.L. under West

Virginia Code section 48-22-306 (2015). 3 The circuit court concluded that it could not find

that Respondent Father abandoned the child because section 48-22-306(a)(2) permits a

finding of abandonment only where the parent “fails to visit or otherwise communicate

with the child when he or she knows where the child resides,” and Respondent Father did

not know where the child resided at the time the adoption petition was filed or in the

preceding six months. See id.

                Upon review of the arguments, the record, and the relevant law, we conclude

that West Virginia Code section 48-22-306(a) does not preclude a finding of abandonment

in a case where the birth parent has the ability to ascertain the child’s whereabouts during

       1
        Consistent with our practice in cases involving sensitive facts, we use initials
where necessary to protect the identities of those involved in this case. See In re K.H., 235
W. Va. 254, 773 S.E.2d 20 (2015).
       2
          See W. Va. Code § 48-22-116 (2015) (defining “stepparent adoption” as “an
adoption in which the petitioner for adoption is married to one of the birth parents of the
child or to an adoptive parent of the child.”).
       3
           Id. § 48-22-306(a) is set out infra in full.

                                                 1
the relevant time frame but willfully fails to do so. Accordingly, we reverse the circuit

court’s order denying the adoption petition and remand this matter for proceedings

consistent with this opinion.

                I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

              R.L. was born in September 2010 to Petitioner Mother and Respondent

Father. At the time, Respondent Father was not listed on the child’s birth certificate, but

paternity was established during family court proceedings in 2012-2013. 4 R.L. has never

resided with Respondent Father, but has resided continuously with Petitioner Mother since

the time of her birth. Moreover, Petitioner Mother and Petitioner Stepfather married in

2011, and it is undisputed that R.L. has resided continuously with both Petitioners since

she was approximately two months old.

       4
         It appears there were two separate but parallel proceedings, both of which occurred
while Respondent Father was incarcerated. In August 2012, Respondent Father filed a
Petition for Support and/or Allocation of Custodial Responsibility, and the Bureau for
Child Support Enforcement (“BCSE”) filed a Complaint for Paternity.

        In Respondent Father’s action, the Family Court of Jackson County entered a Final
Order on October 4, 2012, allocating all custodial responsibility to Petitioner Mother and
setting Respondent Father’s child support obligation at $0 per month due to Respondent’s
Father’s incarceration. In the BCSE’s action, the family court entered a final order on
February 1, 2013, concluding that Respondent Father was the biological father of R.L., as
confirmed by the results of a paternity test performed in March 2011. The family court
reiterated in its order that, during Respondent Father’s incarceration, his child support
obligation was to be set at $0 per month.

                                             2
                  Respondent Father was intermittently incarcerated during much of R.L.’s

young life. The record lacks clarity as to the specific periods of incarceration and release

or the reasons therefor, but we can glean a rough timeline from a review of the entire record.

First, Respondent Father testified that he was on parole for some undefined period in 2013

but was then reincarcerated. It is apparent that he was released on temporary furloughs in

2015, 5 because during that time he filed a Petition for Modification of the Family Court of

Jackson County’s October 4, 2012, order allocating custodial responsibility to Petitioner

Mother. The family court entered a temporary order granting Respondent Father supervised

visitation at the paternal grandmother’s home and set a review hearing for early 2016. By

the time of the review hearing, Respondent Father had been transferred to a different

correctional facility that did not provide for the temporary furloughs, causing the family

court to dismiss the Petition for Modification and order that Respondent Father be

permitted to file a new petition in the future upon his release from incarceration.

                  It appears that Respondent Father was again paroled in late 2016 or early

2017. Once again, while it is unclear when he was released, he testified below that he was

not incarcerated for “the majority of 2017” 6 but that he returned to prison in September

        The record does not clarify why Respondent Father was temporarily released from
         5

incarceration, but it appears that it was related to some form of work-release.
         6
             At no point during that period of release did he seek modification of the custodial
order.

                                                 3
2017. 7 Finally, Respondent Father testified that he was paroled again in December 2018

and remained out of prison until he discharged his parole in early 2020.

              Shortly after his release in December 2018, Respondent Father had a chance

visit with R.L. when the child was visiting her paternal grandmother on New Year’s Eve

2018 and/or New Year’s Day 2019. The evidence was undisputed that the visit was

unplanned and occurred only because Respondent Father happened to be at the

grandmother’s home. 8 He testified that he took R.L. to Walmart and bought her a belated

Christmas gift. It is undisputed that this is the last time Respondent Father visited or had

any contact with R.L.

              In April 2021, Respondent Father filed a second petition for modification of

the 2012 custodial order. There are no documents pertaining to this petition in the record

save the May 5, 2021, order dismissing it without prejudice. The only finding contained

in that order states: “the [c]ourt finds that the petition fails to state a significant change in

       7
          Respondent Father testified that after this reincarceration, he sent R.L. a single
letter in the summer of 2018 containing a number of drawings he had made.
       8
         Petitioners testified below regarding their lack of knowledge about this visit. They
were both unaware that Respondent Father would be at the grandmother’s home at the time.
Petitioner Mother testified that she would not have permitted the visit to occur without
“some discussion” beforehand, while Petitioner Stepfather testified that had he known
Respondent Father would be at the home, he would not have permitted the visit. In any
case, the visit occurred without incident.

                                               4
circumstances that would warrant a modification under the West Virginia code.”

Respondent Father did not appeal that order.

             Thereafter, in June 2021, Petitioners filed the underlying petition for

adoption in the Circuit Court of Wayne County, West Virginia, seeking to allow Petitioner

Stepfather to adopt R.L. Respondent Father contested the adoption, thus requiring the

circuit court to determine whether Respondent Father had abandoned R.L. as set forth in

West Virginia Code section 48-22-306. The matter proceeded to a hearing before the court

spanning two days, July 20 and July 23, 2021, during which the court heard the testimony

of Petitioners, Respondent Father, and the paternal grandmother. In addition to the facts

set out above, Respondent Father conceded in his testimony that he had provided no

financial support for R.L. from the time of her birth, even though he had means to do so

after his release from incarceration in 2018 when he twice had gainful, full-time

employment paying $20 per hour.

             For purposes of this appeal, the primary point of contention below stemmed

from Respondent Father’s assertion that he did not know where R.L. resided in the six

months preceding the filing of the adoption petition, and that the last time he knew the

child’s address was in 2018. In this regard, Petitioners conceded that they had relocated

from Ravenswood, Jackson County, West Virginia, to Ceredo, Wayne County, West

Virginia, in October 2020, and further conceded that they did not inform Respondent Father

of their relocation. However, both Petitioners and Respondent Father testified that

                                            5
Respondent Father had their telephone number—just as he had for the preceding ten

years—and that he had, in fact, used that number to contact them days before the July 20,

2021, adoption hearing. 9

              Ultimately, on September 17, 2021 the circuit court entered an order denying

the petition for adoption. In that order the court found that R.L. had resided continuously

with Petitioners for the span of her life, that Petitioner Stepfather was of good moral

character and a fit and proper person to adopt the child, and that he had been the child’s

psychological father since 2012. The circuit court further intimated its belief that granting

the adoption would be in R.L.’s best interest. However, the court concluded that it could

not grant the adoption because, while it could readily find that Respondent Father failed to

financially support the child, it could not find that Respondent Father “fail[ed] to visit or

otherwise communicate with the child when he . . . [knew] where the child reside[d]”

because the evidence showed that he did not know the child’s address at the time the

adoption petition was filed or in the preceding six months. The circuit court explained that

based on the language contained in the relevant statute, section 48-22-306(a)(2) precluded

       9
        Respondent Father did not request to speak to R.L. at the time of that phone call,
nor is there evidence that he had ever attempted to communicate with the child via
telephone in the years prior.

                                             6
the court from finding abandonment and thus precluded it from granting the petition for

adoption. Petitioners now appeal that order. 10

                             II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

              In adoption proceedings, the Court has set forth the following standard of

review:

                      “In reviewing challenges to the findings and
              conclusions of the circuit court, we apply a two-prong
              deferential standard of review. We review the final order and
              the ultimate disposition under an abuse of discretion standard,
              and we review the circuit court’s underlying factual findings
              under a clearly erroneous standard. Questions of law are
              subject to a de novo review.” Syllabus point 2, Walker v. West
              Virginia Ethics Commission, 201 W.Va. 108, 492 S.E.2d 167
              (1997).

Syl. Pt. 1, In re Adoption of Jon L., 218 W. Va. 489, 625 S.E.2d 251 (2005). With this

standard in mind, we proceed to address the arguments on appeal.

                                    III. DISCUSSION

              Petitioners challenge the circuit court’s conclusion that it could not find that

Respondent Father abandoned R.L. pursuant to West Virginia Code section 48-22-306

because Respondent Father did not know where the child resided. 11 Specifically, they

       10
          This Court received briefing and argument only from Petitioners. Respondent
Father filed no responsive pleading, despite having been served a Notice of Intent to
Sanction on May 31, 2022.

        There was also some discussion in Petitioners’ brief regarding whether
       11

Respondent Father’s April 2021 petition for modification constituted an attempt to
                                              7
argue that Respondent Father had the ability to ascertain the child’s residence at any time

by simply calling them on the phone but failed to do so at any point. Accordingly,

Petitioners contend that the requirement in section 48-22-306(a)(2) that the birth parent

“know” where the child resides should not operate to thwart a finding of abandonment

where the birth parent has remained willfully ignorant of the child’s whereabouts. We

agree.

              To reiterate, the crux of this case is whether the circuit court erred in

concluding that it was precluded from finding abandonment because Father did not know

where the child resided, without any consideration as to whether Father could have

communicate with the child for purposes of an abandonment analysis under West Virginia
Code section 48-22-306. This Court has previously explained that

              [w]e do not believe that initiating litigation against the
              custodians of the child, albeit for a proper purpose, can be
              construed as parental visitation or communication. The
              [abandonment] statute focuses on whether a biological parent
              has attempted to maintain a parent-child relationship—not
              whether the parent has attempted to assert his or her natural
              right to physical custody of the child.

In re Jeffries, 204 W. Va. 360, 367 n.8, 512 S.E.2d 873, 880 n.8 (1998); see also In re
Adoption of H.G., 246 W. Va. 105, 116-17, 866 S.E.2d 170, 181-82 (2021) (concluding
that birth mother’s filing a petition to modify a guardianship order, and failing to pursue it,
was insufficient to thwart a finding of abandonment). In re Jeffries dealt with a petition
for custody, so we have no trouble extending the logic employed there to the instant petition
to modify a custodial order. As explained in In re Jeffries, the critical issue is whether the
biological parent has attempted to maintain a relationship with the child. Here, the
evidence is undisputed that Respondent Father did not do so. Accordingly, we give no
weight to his April 2021 petition for modification of a custodial order.

                                              8
ascertained that information. Abandonment determinations in adoption proceedings are

governed, in part, by West Virginia Code section 48-22-306, which provides, in relevant

part:

              (a) Abandonment of a child over the age of six months shall be
              presumed when the birth parent:

                     (1) Fails to financially support the child within the
                     means of the birth parent; and

                     (2) Fails to visit or otherwise communicate with the
                     child when he or she knows where the child resides, is
                     physically and financially able to do so and is not
                     prevented from doing so by the person or authorized
                     agency having the care or custody of the child:
                     Provided, That such failure to act continues
                     uninterrupted for a period of six months immediately
                     preceding the filing of the adoption petition.

Id. § 48-22-306(a). As we have explained, in order to find abandonment, “the plain

language of the statute requires the failure of the child’s birth parent to (1) financially

support the child within his or her means, and (2) visit or communicate with the child when

the birth parent knows where the child resides, is physically and financially able to do so,

and has not been prevented from doing so, for a period of six months prior to the filing of

the adoption petition.” In re Adoption of H.G., 246 W. Va. at 114, 866 S.E.2d at 179.

              The circuit court determined that the first prong of the statute had been met

insofar as Respondent Father conceded below that he failed to provide R.L with any

financial support during her lifetime, despite having means to do so. See id. The record

amply bears this out as Respondent Father admitted as much below, and accordingly we

                                             9
find no error in the circuit court’s determination on this point. However, we must also

consider the second prong of the statute to determine whether the circuit court erred in

finding that abandonment could not be established because Respondent Father did not

know where the child resided. Phrased differently, the question for this Court is whether

the statutory requirement that the birth parent “knows where the child resides” is subject

to strict application, i.e., with no consideration of relevant circumstances. We easily

conclude that it is not, as we first suggested twenty-five years ago in In re Jeffries. See 204

W. Va. at 360, 512 S.E.2d at 873.

              In re Jeffries was another adoption case wherein, as with the case at bar, the

primary question was whether a child’s biological father had abandoned her. The father

testified at the adoption hearing that he had made no effort to visit or communicate with

the child because he “didn’t know where she was” and had lost the biological mother’s

phone number. Id. at 363-64, 512 S.E.2d at 876-77. The father further admitted that he

never tried to ascertain the child’s whereabouts to arrange a visit or otherwise communicate

with her. Id. at 364, 512 S.E.2d at 877. Notwithstanding this evidence, the circuit court

concluded that the father had not abandoned the child because he did not know her place

of residence and had made a “reasonable effort to try to determine both the location of this

child and to make visitation with the child.” Id.

              We reversed, explaining first that “it is ‘highly relevant for the circuit court

to consider. . .whether the [biological parent]. . .was dilatory in grasping the opportunity to

                                              10
assert his parental rights and responsibilities.’” Id. at 367, 512 S.E.2d at 880 (quoting State

ex rel. Roy Allen S. v. Stone, 196 W. Va. 624, 638, 474 S.E.2d 554, 568 (1996)). We went

on to recount the evidence showing that the father had, by his own admission, made no

effort to visit or communicate with the child before concluding that

              the trial court erred in its conclusion that the appellee tried but
              was unable to determine the location of the child and to make
              arrangements for visitation. While the appellee may not have
              known where his child was specifically located at the time of
              her April 1996 birth, we see nothing in the record showing that
              the appellee himself ever tried to determine her whereabouts in
              the 18 months preceding the October 1997 hearing.

Id. at 368, 512 S.E.2d at 881; see also In re Adoption of I.J.E., No. 17-1133, 2018 WL

5099648 (W. Va. Oct. 19, 2018) (memorandum decision) (concluding that the circuit court

did not err in finding abandonment where a biological father failed to attempt to learn the

children’s whereabouts). In short, we have long recognized that a birth parent who has the

ability to determine his or her child’s whereabouts, but makes no attempt to do so, may not

use that lack of knowledge to thwart a finding of abandonment.

              The requirement in section 48-22-306(a)(2) that a birth parent know where

the child resides is designed to protect a birth parent who has been intentionally deprived

of that information or is otherwise not reasonably able to ascertain the information of his

or her own accord. The statutory language is not meant to enable a birth parent who has

remained willfully ignorant of the child’s whereabouts to avoid a finding of abandonment

and stymie an otherwise appropriate adoption proceeding. The language of West Virginia

Code section 48-22-306(a)(2) (2015) requiring a birth parent to “visit or otherwise

                                              11
communicate with the child when he or she knows where the child resides” does not

preclude a finding that a birth parent has abandoned a child when the evidence shows that

the birth parent had the ability to ascertain knowledge of the child’s whereabouts and chose

not to do so.

                It is undisputed that Respondent Father had Petitioner Stepfather’s phone

number for more than ten years, that said phone number was still in service, and that

Respondent Father actually called that phone number ten days prior to the adoption hearing

and spoke to Petitioners. There is no question that Respondent Father could have easily

asked at any time in the preceding months where Petitioners were now living and whether

he could arrange a visit with or communicate with R.L.; yet he did not do so. Moreover,

we are convinced that Petitioner Father could have used this same means of communication

in order to maintain a relationship with R.L. in the several years preceding the adoption

proceeding, during which time he admitted he simply made no attempt to communicate

with the child at all. In sum, the record clearly shows that despite clearly having the ability

to communicate with R.L., Respondent Father simply opted not to do so for more than two-

and-a-half years.

                For that reason, we conclude the circuit court erred in failing to find that

Respondent Father abandoned R.L. Accordingly, we reverse the circuit court’s order

                                              12
denying the petition for adoption and remand this matter for further proceedings consistent

with this opinion. 12

                                   IV. CONCLUSION

               For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the Circuit Court of Wayne County’s

September 17, 2021, Final Order, and remand this matter for further proceedings consistent

with this opinion.

                                                                    Reversed and remanded.

       12
          The record indicates that R.L. is now more than twelve years old. As such, on
remand, we remind the circuit court of the statutory requirement that R.L.’s wishes be taken
into account in determining whether the grant the petition for adoption. See W. Va. Code
§ 48-22-301(f) (2015) (“If the child to be adopted is twelve years of age or over, the consent
of the child is required to be given in the presence of a judge of a court of competent
jurisdiction, unless for extraordinary cause, the requirement of such consent is waived by
the court.”).

                                             13