Court Opinion

ID: 9565410
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:20:30.244154+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:37.294994
License: Public Domain

Harrison, J.,
dissenting.
The majority holds that the natural mother of the two infants involved here has no standing, as a matter of law, to intervene in a proceeding for their adoption. The opinion recites that the June 19, 1973 order, pursuant to Code § 16.1-178 (Repl. Vol. 1975), severed all parental rights of the natural mother, rendered her a legal stranger to the children, and therefore her only viable defense to the petition to adopt was the parental unfitness of Mr. and Mrs. Slapnicker.
Mrs. Shank, the natural mother, has been denied the last possible opportunity to establish her suitability to regain custody of her children and to contest their adoption. There is no proceeding that can be as awesome, or is as final, as a proceeding for the adoption of one’s child. It results in a parent being divested of all legal rights and obligations with respect to the child, and in freeing the child from all legal obligations of obedience and maintenance with respect to the natural parent.
The record before us contains no testimony regarding the circumstances surrounding the entry by the court below of the June 19, 1973 order, and the order recites only that it appeared to be in the best interest of the children and the state for the action to be taken. In their petition appellants recite that Mrs. Shank was charged with abusing the children. She alleges that this occurred during a period of time in which she was emotionally disturbed as a result of her recent widowhood, the simultaneous death of both her parents in an airplane crash, her lack of family and friends in the Virginia Beach area and her then state of acute depression. Appellants allege that Mrs. *512Shank has been completely restored to health and rehabilitated; has a happy second marriage; and is now living in Roanoke peacefully and harmoniously with her husband. She professes to have a wide circle of friends and acquaintances and to enjoy a warm and close relationship with her husband’s family. The mother also alleges that she has given birth to another child, which occurred only after medical doctors, competent in the field of psychiatry, had pronounced her fully fit emotionally to care for and have the custody of one or more infant children.
The prayer of appellants’ petition was that the adoption proceeding be suspended and enjoined until their petition for restoration of custody be considered; and that if the adoption proceedings be not enjoined and suspended, that they be permitted to intervene therein as parties. The court below summarily denied the petition, upon the ground that its order of June 19, 1973, was dispositive of the issue of custody, and also denied appellants the right to intervene in the adoption proceedings.
The State seeks to rehabilitate the most depraved criminal in its penitentiary and holds out to him hope of being restored to society. Notwithstanding this, by our affirmation here we hold that once a court, acting under Code § 16.1-178, orders that a child be separated permanently from the parent, such parent, regardless of circumstances or conditions, can never be considered as a proper person to regain and have the custody of the child. No amount of rehabilitation by that erring parent can help.
In Dyer v. Howell, 212 Va. 453, 184 S.E.2d 789 (1971), a husband who killed his wife was formally divested of the custody of his infant daughter, Kathy. The husband subsequently attended college, was gainfully employed, remarried, became the father of a second child and sought to regain custody of Kathy. While he was not successful, Dyer’s petition to regain such custody was heard and considered. It was denied upon the ground that Dyer had not shown that it would be in the best interest of his daughter to restore her custody to him. Significantly, we said there: “In so holding, we have not overlooked the expressed and obviously sincere desire of the father to have the child with him or his claimed right as the natural parent, which in different circumstances we would respect, to be awarded her custody.” 212 Va. at 458, 184 S.E.2d at 793.
*513It is not contended that the June 19,1973 order was of no force and effect. In Dyer, supra, and more recently in McEntire v. Redfearn, 217 Va. 313, 227 S.E.2d 741 (1976), we recognized the importance of an unappealed, merit adjudication by a court of competent jurisdiction determining custody of children based upon then existing facts. Admittedly, when such an adjudication is made, the parent is no longer clothed with the parental presumption accorded natural parents in a dispute with non parents. However, in an adoption proceeding, as in custody cases, the welfare of the child is always the paramount consideration. All that Mrs. Shank seeks in this case is that she be permitted to intervene before the finality of adoption occurs, and be accorded an opportunity to attempt to establish that the conditions and circumstances which precipitated the 1973 order have so completely changed since that time that it would now be in her children’s best interest for their custody to be restored to her. Instead, the majority has said to her, the natural mother, that the only viable defense to a petition filed to adopt her children is the “parental unfitness” of the adopting petitioners. There are many instances where adopting parents could not be shown as unfit, but where the welfare of the children they sought to adopt would not be best promoted by such adoption.
Important to this decision is the fact that when appellants filed their petition in the lower court, the permanent custody of the two children involved had never been awarded the Slapnickers and the Slapnickers had just filed a petition for their adoption. It is inconceivable that the General Assembly intended that, under these circumstances, action taken by a court pursuant to Code § 16.1-178 could result in denying a natural mother standing to seek the custody of her children or standing to protest their adoption. In effect, we have accorded action by a court under Code § 16.1-178 the same dignity and finality as was formerly accorded only a final order of adoption.
I would reverse, stay the proceeding for adoption, permit appellants to intervene, and grant them a hearing on their petition. If the evidence establishes that the best interest of the infants would be served by permitting Mr. and Mrs. Slapnicker to adopt them, as recommended by the Department of Social Services of the City of Virginia Beach, such adoption can then be so ordered. A fortiori, and while Mrs. Shank may have a heavy burden, if she can establish by proper evidence, and to the satisfaction of the court, that the best interest of the children *514would be served by restoring to this natural mother their custody and by denying the petition for adoption, this course should be followed. For the court to do otherwise, in the face of such evidence, it would have to repudiate every case we have decided involving the custody or adoption of infants.
FAnson, C.J., and Cochran, J., join in dissent.