Court Opinion

ID: 9545212
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:08:22.898293+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:14:19.325106
License: Public Domain

SIMMS, Justice,
specially concurring.
I also agree with the majority that the evidence was insufficient to support the trial court’s adjudication of these children as dependent and neglected children under our Juvenile Code.
Additionally, I agree with Justice Doo-lin’s observation that the trial court erred in failing to separate the adjudicatory and *257dispositional phases of this proceeding. The statutory requirement of a bifurcated procedure is a matter of jurisdictional significance, it is mandatory and cannot be overlooked by our courts. At the adjudicatory hearing the court must determine whether the allegations of the petition are true and whether the child comes within the purview of the Code. If so, and if the court finds that the child’s best interests would be served, then the court shall sustain the petition and make an order of adjudication setting forth whether the child is delinquent, dependent and neglected or in need of supervision and make the child a ward of the court (10 O.S.1971, § 1114.).
Only after the adjudication may the court proceed in the matter of ascertaining the proper disposition of the child (10 O.S.1971, §§ 1115, 1116); because it is only after making the adjudication that the court has jurisdiction over the child (10 O.S.Supp. 1972, § 1102). It is the adjudicatory hearing which determines whether or not the state, through its juvenile court, shall interfere with the child and his life.
Because of the tremendous importance that the outcome of the adjudicatory hearing will have upon a child and his family, I must go one step further than Justice Doo-lin’s suggestion that the court appoint counsel for children at the dispositional hearings, and urge such appointment at the adjudicatory hearing. I believe that representation of the child’s interests at only the dispositional hearing, while certainly helpful, is too little and too late.