Court Opinion

ID: 9955153
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-27 19:02:16.455279+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:15:17.743003
License: Public Domain

Filed 3/27/24 In re V.A. CA2/5
   NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on
opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule
8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for
purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

                      SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

                                    DIVISION FIVE

In re V.A. et al., Persons Coming                                  B327613
Under the Juvenile Court Law.
___________________________________                                (Los Angeles County
LOS ANGELES COUNTY                                                 Super. Ct. No.
DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND                                         22CCJP03783A-D)
FAMILY SERVICES,

        Plaintiff and Respondent,

        v.

J.Q.,

        Defendant and Appellant.

      APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los
Angeles County, Tamara Hall, Judge. Dismissed.
      Christopher R. Booth, under appointment by the Court of
Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
      Dawyn R. Harrison, County Counsel, Kim Nemoy,
Assistant County Counsel, and Kelly G. Emling, Deputy County
Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
      J.Q. (Father) is the father of four children: 16-year-old
daughter V.A., 15-year-old daughter K.A, 13-year-old daughter
N.A., and nine-year-old son C.A. (collectively, Minors).1 The
juvenile court assumed dependency jurisdiction over Minors
based on its findings that Father manhandled V.A. and punched
K.A. in the face during a quarrel in public and had, on prior
occasions, struck all of his children in anger. We consider (1)
whether the appeal should be dismissed as moot as to the three
younger children in light of the juvenile court’s later order
terminating dependency jurisdiction over them and (2) whether
the appeal should be dismissed as to the oldest child because the
disposition hearing as to her was not completed (her whereabouts
were then unknown) at the time the appeal was noticed.

                        I. BACKGROUND
      A.     The Dependency Investigation and Petition
      On Sunday, August 21, 2022, Damela Romo (Romo) saw
Father chase after V.A. and K.A., grab them each by an arm, and
pull them back toward him. V.A. broke free from Father’s grasp
and Father raised his right arm and punched K.A. in the face.
According to Romo, the punch was so loud she was able to hear
the impact from where she was standing. She videotaped the
aftermath of the incident, which appeared to show V.A. and K.A.
crying, and then called the police.
      When interviewed by the police, Father (who was separated
from Minors’ mother) explained he worked as a street vendor
selling food and he brought his children to work with him

1
     These were Minors’ ages when dependency proceedings
began.

                                2
because there was no one else to look after them. According to
Father, when he saw his two older daughters get out of an
unfamiliar automobile driven by men he did not recognize, he
began upbraiding them and grabbed their arms to bring them
back to his food stand. He denied striking or slapping either of
his daughters.
      V.A. and K.A. told the police the incident began when they
asked two friends to drive them to a nearby fast food restaurant
so they could use the restroom. When they returned, Father
became outraged and grabbed them by their arms. V.A. escaped
from Father’s hold, but Father struck K.A. in the face.2
      The police reported the matter to the Los Angeles County
Department of Children and Family Services (the Department).
A Department social worker interviewed Minors, who had been
taken into protective custody and placed with a family friend.
V.A. and K.A. said that Father slapped them and their siblings
on prior occasions when they failed to help him with the food
stand, but they denied these slaps ever left any marks or bruises.
N.A. related that, on the day of the incident before her older
sisters returned, Father “smacked” her with an open hand on the
back of the head and on the chest after she told him she did not
know where her sisters had gone. N.A. and C.A. also said that
Father had in the past “smack[ed]” them with an open hand
when angry.
      In September 2022, the Department filed a multi-count
dependency petition asking the juvenile court to assume
jurisdiction over Minors under Welfare and Institutions Code

2
      V.A. told the police Father struck her sister with his fist,
while K.A. stated he slapped her with his open palm.

                                  3
section 300, subdivisions (a), (b)(1), and (j).3 At the initial
detention hearing, the juvenile court ordered the three younger
siblings released into their parents’ care under Department
supervision. The whereabouts of V.A. were then unknown, and
the court ordered her detained “at large” under the Department’s
supervision and issued a protective custody warrant for her.
      Before the adjudication hearing, the Department reported
K.A. resided with Mother, N.A. and C.A. lived with Father, and
V.A.’s whereabouts remained unknown. The juvenile court
sustained the petition at an adjudication hearing in February
2023, finding all four Minors (including V.A.) were persons
described by section 300, subdivisions (a), (b), and (j). The court
placed each Minor in the home of their parents under the
Department’s supervision. As to V.A., the court set a future
warrant status hearing while maintaining the previously issued
protective custody warrant in full force and effect.
      Father appealed the juvenile court’s jurisdiction findings in
a notice of appeal filed five days after the jurisdiction hearing.
During the pendency of the appeal, this court took judicial notice
of subsequent minute orders entered by the juvenile court. A
judicially noticed last minute information report submitted by
the Department in advance of a dependency review hearing in
August 2023 states “[V.A.’s] status remains AWOL” and
recommends the juvenile court keep her case open while
terminating jurisdiction for the other Minors “with a Family Law
Order giving joint legal, joint physical [custody] to the parents.”
The subsequent minute orders issued in connection with the

3
     Undesignated statutory references that follow are to the
Welfare and Institutions Code.

                                 4
August 2023 review hearing indicate the juvenile court
terminated jurisdiction over K.A., N.A., and C.A. and released
them to “parent(s).” The August 2023 minute order concerning
V.A. states her whereabouts remain unknown, the protective
custody warrant remains in full force and effect, and the “[c]ourt
continues the disposition hearing to 2/15/24.”

                           II. DISCUSSION
       We shall dismiss the appeal because it is in large part moot
and, in case of V.A., is taken from a non-appealable order.
       “A court is tasked with the duty ‘“to decide actual
controversies by a judgment which can be carried into effect, and
not to give opinions upon moot questions or abstract propositions,
or to declare principles or rules of law which cannot affect the
matter in issue in the case before it.”’ [Citation.] A case becomes
moot when events ‘“render[ ] it impossible for [a] court, if it
should decide the case in favor of plaintiff, to grant him any
effect[ive] relief.”’ [Citation.] For relief to be ‘effective,’ two
requirements must be met. First, the plaintiff must complain of
an ongoing harm. Second, the harm must be redressable or
capable of being rectified by the outcome the plaintiff seeks.
[Citation.] [¶] This rule applies in the dependency context. (In
re N.S. (2016) 245 Cal.App.4th 53, 60 [‘the critical factor in
considering whether a dependency appeal is moot is whether the
appellate court can provide any effective relief if it finds
reversible error’].)” (In re D.P. (2023) 14 Cal.5th 266, 276.)
       The Department’s respondent’s brief argues the appeal is
moot as to the three youngest children who were before the
juvenile court during the proceedings below. That is correct.
Although the juvenile court initially took dependency jurisdiction

                                 5
over all three children, the judicially noticed orders indicate the
court has since terminated its jurisdiction and returned the
children to their parents’ custody. There is accordingly no
effective relief we can provide even were we to find any of the
jurisdiction findings against Father infirm. (D.P., supra, 14
Cal.5th at 277 [“relief is effective when it ‘can have a practical,
tangible impact on the parties’ conduct or legal status’”].) Father
has not argued we should exercise our discretion to reach the
moot jurisdictional issue, so we shall dismiss as moot the appeal
as to K.A., N.A., and C.A.
       The same reasoning does not apply to V.A. because her
whereabouts remained unknown in August 2023 and the court
kept her case open by continuing her disposition hearing to a
later date. But dismissal is still required for the separate reason
articulated by the Department: the appeal as to V.A. was taken
from a non-appealable order. Dependency court orders become
appealable only after the juvenile court concludes disposition.
(Welf. & Inst. Code, § 395 [“A judgment in a proceeding under
Section 300 may be appealed in the same manner as any final
judgment, and any subsequent order may be appealed as an
order after judgment”]; In re S.B. (2009) 46 Cal. 4th 529, 532
[“The dispositional order is the ‘judgment’ referred to in section
395, and all subsequent orders are appealable”].) Because the
disposition hearing as to V.A. was not completed at the time the
appeal was noticed, the appeal must be dismissed as taken from
a non-appealable order.

                                 6
                        DISPOSITION
     The appeal is dismissed.

   NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

                   BAKER, Acting P. J.
We concur:

     MOOR, J.

     KIM, J.

                           7