Court Opinion

ID: 9889814
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-11 17:07:39.685729+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:49:03.340840
License: Public Domain

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

                                    No. 23-0145
                              Filed October 11, 2023

IN THE INTEREST OF Z.T.,
Minor Child,

J.V., Mother,
       Petitioner-Appellee,

N.T., Father,
       Respondent-Appellant.
________________________________________________________________

       Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Osceola County, Shawna L.

Ditsworth, District Associate Judge.

       A father appeals the termination of his parental rights under Iowa Code

chapter 600A. AFFIRMED.

       Jennifer Bennett Finn of Pelzer Law Firm, LLC, Estherville, for appellant.

       Michael L. Sandy and Alexandria Celli Smith of Sandy Law Firm, P.C., Spirit

Lake, for appellee.

       Abby Lynn Goettsch Walleck of Maahs & Walleck, Spirit Lake, attorney and

guardian ad litem for minor child.

       Considered by Tabor, P.J., Buller, J., and Danilson, S.J.*

       *Senior judge assigned by order pursuant to Iowa Code section 602.9206

(2023).
                                          2

TABOR, Presiding Judge.

       Did writing letters daily to his daughter during a second stint in prison—but

not sending them to her home—constitute “regular communication” to avoid a

finding of abandonment against this father under Iowa Code section 600A.8(3)(b)

(2023)? The juvenile court decided it did not.

       That father, Nathan, appeals the juvenile court’s order terminating his

parental rights to his thirteen-year-old daughter, Z.T. He argues the mother, Jade,

did not offer clear and convincing evidence that he abandoned Z.T. under Iowa

Code sections 600A.2(20) and 600A.8(3)(b). He also disputes the finding that he

failed to support the child financially under section 600A.8(4). Finally, he argues

termination of his rights was not in Z.T.’s best interests.

       Like the juvenile court, we find Jade met her burden of proof on both

abandonment and best interests. After our independent assessment of the record,

we affirm the termination order.1

       I.     Facts and Prior Proceedings

       Nathan and Jade met when they were teenagers. Jade recalled that’s when

she was “introduced” to methamphetamine. They were in their early twenties when

Z.T. was born. Jade later described Nathan as “physically and mentally abusive.”

       The couple separated in 2014 when Z.T. was four years old. For about a

year after that separation, Nathan had regular visits with his daughter. But those

1 We review the record de novo.     In re G.A., 826 N.W.2d 125, 127 (Iowa Ct. App.
2012). We defer to the juvenile court’s fact findings, particularly on witness
credibility, but those findings do not bind us. In re R.K.B., 572 N.W.2d 600, 601
(Iowa 1998). Our primary concern is the child’s best interests, though we give “due
consideration” to the interests of the parent. Iowa Code § 600A.1; G.A., 826
N.W.2d at 127.
                                           3

interactions ended when Nathan went to prison. While incarcerated he did not

have in-person contact with Z.T., but he did write her letters, which Jade found

appropriate and allowed their daughter to read. Nathan served about one year in

prison. His visits with Z.T. resumed upon his release in 2016. Jade recalled that

she sometimes gave him rides to Z.T.’s school events.

       But their geniality faded in 2019 when Nathan became less reliable and

started sending hostile text messages. Jade feared that he was using drugs. That

fall she obtained a civil protective order that placed Z.T., then nine years old, in her

temporary custody. The order did not list Z.T. as a protected party. But Nathan

did not attend the hearing to determine visitation. He later offered two reasons for

his absence: “I didn’t have transportation, and a bigger one being that I had

warrants out at the time and I was on the run.”

       Nathan has not seen Z.T. since 2019. He did not initiate contact even after

the protective order expired in September 2020. But he did petition for custody

and visitation in December 2020. Shortly after filing that petition, he showed up

unannounced at Jade’s home.2 He was then on pretrial release for a burglary

charge. She called the sheriff, who advised Nathan to stay off her property. Then

a few days before the March 2021 hearing scheduled on his petition, he went back

to prison. As the district court noted: “The custody case remains open without any

order for temporary or permanent custody or visitation.”

2 Nathan testified that he figured out where Jade lived by looking at a photograph

that his mother had of Z.T. in the front yard, and he then “skimmed” every
farmhouse in the vicinity on Google Earth to identify her location.
                                          4

       Like he did during his previous prison term, Nathan wrote letters to Z.T. In

his words, “I wrote her every day. I would send one envelope out a week and it

was full of at least seven letters.” But unlike before, this time he did not mail them

to Jade. Instead, he sent the letters to his own mother’s address. He explained

that he did not send the letters to Jade because he was afraid that “they would be

destroyed.” He hoped that “sometime in the future” Jade would “come around and

at least contact my mom, because they had a good relationship together, and then

thinking that [Z.T.] would be able to get those letters.” Jade did not know the letters

existed until the termination trial. Had she received them, Jade said, she would

have let Z.T. decide whether to read them.

       In September 2022, while Nathan was in prison, Jade petitioned to

terminate his parental rights. That December, the court heard testimony from

Jade, Nathan, and Nathan’s mother and father.

       On child support, Jade testified that Nathan was not ordered to pay support

until May 2017.3 In the first two years of court-ordered support, he fell behind,

paying no support at all in 2019. Since 2020, he increased his payments to catch

up on his obligation. To that end, in October 2021, while he was in prison, he paid

a lump sum of $1800 to reduce his arrears. Jade believed that money came from

his mother or father. But Nathan insisted it was his own money. As of the

termination hearing, he was just $536 behind in his support.

3 Jade testified that he did not provide any support between 2014 and 2017.
                                          5

       The court terminated Nathan’s rights under sections 600A.8(3)(b)

(abandonment) and 600A.8(4) (court-ordered support).            He challenges both

alternatives on appeal.

       II.    Analysis

       Iowa Code chapter 600A governs petitions filed by one parent to terminate

the legal rights of the other parent, so-called “private” terminations. In re B.H.A.,

938 N.W.2d 227, 232 (2020). The petitioner, Jade, has a two-pronged burden.

See id. First, she must prove by clear and convincing evidence that Nathan either

abandoned Z.T. or failed to support her financially.              See Iowa Code

§§ 600A.8(3)(b), .8(4). Second, Jade must show termination is in Z.T.’s best

interests. See id. § 600A.1; B.H.A., 938 N.W.2d at 232. Nathan challenges her

proof under both prongs.

       A. Abandonment

       When a juvenile court terminates parental rights on more than one ground,

if one of the grounds is established by clear and convincing evidence, we will

uphold the termination. In re B.L.A., 357 N.W.2d 20, 22 (Iowa 1984). We find

ample evidence in the record to support termination of Nathan’s parental rights for

abandonment under Iowa Code section 600A.8(3)(b).

       “To abandon a minor child” means the parent “rejects the duties imposed

by the parent-child relationship, . . . while being able to do so, making no provision

or making only a marginal effort to provide for the support of the child or to

communicate with the child.” Iowa Code § 600A.2(20).

       When, as here, the child is older than six months, the legislature considers

a parent to have abandoned that child
                                          6

       unless the parent maintains substantial and continuous or repeated
       contact with the child as demonstrated by contribution toward
       support of the child of a reasonable amount, according to the parent’s
       means, and as demonstrated by any of the following:
              (1) Visiting the child at least monthly when physically and
       financially able to do so and when not prevented from doing so by
       the person having lawful custody of the child.
              (2) Regular communication with the child or with the person
       having the care or custody of the child, when physically and
       financially unable to visit the child or when prevented from visiting
       the child by the person having lawful custody of the child.
              (3) Openly living with the child for a period of six months within
       the one-year period immediately preceding the termination of
       parental rights hearing and during that period openly holding himself
       or herself out to be the parent of the child.

Id. § 600A.8(3)(b).

       Nathan argues that the grounds for abandonment were not met because he

“wrote letters almost every day to his daughter since his incarceration.” He also

claims that he asked his parents to send Z.T. gifts while he was in prison. He

recounts that his mother sent Z.T. a card in 2021 that was “never opened or given

to the child.” We read his argument as contesting Jade’s proof under subsection

two: that he did not maintain “regular communication with the child” to demonstrate

his “substantial and continuous or repeated contact.”

       Jade disputes his claim that the letters were “regular communication” with

Z.T. She asserts: “By sending these letters to a third party as opposed to the

minor’s mother, not only does the chance of receipt by the minor decrease rapidly,

but such correspondence is not even correspondence with the minor but rather

correspondence with his own mother.” She also notes Nathan’s own testimony

that he planned to give all of the letters to Z.T. “someday.”

       We find Jade’s position more persuasive.              Letters mailed to an

intermediary—with no realistic expectation that they would be passed on to Z.T. or
                                          7

Jade—do not fit the definition of “regular communication with the child” under

section 600A.8(3)(b)(2). Chapter 600A does not define that phrase. But we can

look to the dictionary as a source for the common meaning of those words. State

v. Damme, 944 N.W.2d 98, 104 (Iowa 2020). In this context, communication

means “a piece of conveyed information.”                 Communication, Merriam-

Webster.com, www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/communication. And regular

means “appearing or occurring repeatedly from time to time.” Regular, Merriam-

Webster.com, www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/regular.             Those definitions

confirm that the information must be conveyed on a frequent basis. On top of that,

the legislature included the prepositional phrase “with the child”—which rules out

merely archiving the letters for later consumption.

       Nathan has made, at best, a marginal effort to communicate with Z.T. during

his most recent prison term. Our supreme court has said repeatedly that “[a parent]

cannot use his incarceration as a justification for his lack of a relationship with the

child.” B.H.A., 938 N.W.2d at 234. And Jade was “under no duty to ensure” that

he kept in touch with Z.T. See id. But that is not to say that every “incarcerated

parent should lose his or her parental rights because of their incarceration.” See

id. at 242 (Appel, J., dissenting). It’s the added fact that Nathan was more dutiful

about maintaining contact with Z.T. during an earlier stint in prison. His decision

this time to stockpile letters for Z.T. did not justify preserving his parental rights.

We thus affirm the abandonment finding.4

4 Because we affirm on the abandonment ground, we need not reach his argument

on the court-ordered child support. See B.L.A., 357 N.W.2d at 22.
                                          8

       B. Best Interests

       Nathan contends termination was not in Z.T.’s best interests because he

has “always been a big part of her life.” He recognizes he would have to rebuild

the trust between them, but believes that he can be a positive influence down the

road. He also points out that termination will deprive Z.T. of the benefits of

extended family—especially her paternal grandmother.

       Defending the juvenile court’s ruling, Jade argues that Nathan shouldered

no parental responsibility for over three years, not even the limited measures he

could have taken while incarcerated.

       To evaluate best interests, we use this statutory definition:

              The best interest of a child requires that each biological parent
       affirmatively assume the duties encompassed by the role of being a
       parent. In determining whether a parent has affirmatively assumed
       the duties of a parent, the court shall consider, but is not limited to
       consideration of, the fulfillment of financial obligations,
       demonstration of continued interest in the child, demonstration of a
       genuine effort to maintain communication with the child, and
       demonstration of the establishment and maintenance of a place of
       importance in the child's life.

Iowa Code § 600A.1(2).

       Nathan had no contact with Z.T. for three and one-half years—about one

third of her life. Given that long absence, he has not maintained a vital place in his

daughter’s life.

       That assessment is bolstered by the opinion of Z.T.’s guardian ad litem. At

the hearing, the GAL conveyed the teenager’s views:

       She expressed that her dad has been in prison more than out in the
       last four years and, thus, he has not been around, in which have
       been formative years for her and he has missed a lot and she doesn’t
       believe he deserves to now have time with her. She is happy and
       comfortable in her current environment and does not want to see that
                                         9

      change. She expressed that she wants to have—if she wants to
      have a relationship with her dad, it would need to be on her own
      terms, based on how he behaves when he is finally out of prison.

The GAL also provided an insightful take on the issue of extended family: “ While I

have empathy for these grandparents and hope that Jade would work with them

to have some contact, this hearing is about Nathan’s rights and not the

grandparents.” We echo those sentiments. See In re W.S.T., No. 07-1564, 2008

WL 4307986, at *2 (Iowa Ct. App. Sept. 17, 2008) (“To affirm the termination will

cut the child off from the father and his extended family. Yet the father has not

maintained the contact with the child he should have.”). In the end, the best-

interest factors in chapter 600A favor terminating Nathan’s rights.

      AFFIRMED.