Court Opinion

ID: 9928109
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-01-30 20:05:33.174046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:49:11.476930
License: Public Domain

Filed 1/30/24 In re B.M. CA2/4
         NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS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
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     IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

                            SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

                                        DIVISION FOUR

In re B.M. et al., Persons                                   B328114
Coming Under the Juvenile
Court Law.                                             (Los Angeles County
                                                       Super. Ct. Nos.
                                                       18CCJP03690,
                                                       18CCJP03690E-H

LOS ANGELES COUNTY
DEPARTMENT OF
CHILDREN AND FAMILY
SERVICES,

         Plaintiff and Respondent,

         v.

W.V.,

         Defendant and Appellant.

      APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of
Los Angeles County, Pete R. Navarro, Judge Pro Tempore.
Affirmed.
      Cristina Gabrielidis, under appointment by the Court of
Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
      Dawyn R. Harrison, County Counsel, Kim Nemoy,
Assistant County Counsel, Brian Mahler, Deputy County
Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

                          INTRODUCTION
       This is one of the increasingly common juvenile dependency
cases that follows a certain fact pattern. The Los Angeles County
Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) failed to
comply with its inquiry requirements under the Indian Child
Welfare Act of 1978 (25 U.S.C. § 1901 et seq.) (ICWA) and related
state laws (Welf. & Inst. Code, § 224 et seq.1). The parents of the
child affirmatively represented to DCFS and the juvenile court
that they do not have Native American ancestry. Following
termination of parental rights under section 366.26, however, a
parent appealed on the grounds that ICWA inquiries were not
made of certain members of the child’s extended family. (See,
e.g., In re Ezequiel G. (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 984, 995.) We agree
with our colleagues in Division Three of this district that these
cases “unquestionably delay permanency for some of the most
vulnerable children in our juvenile court system,” and are
“ineffective in protecting the interests of the Indian communities
and families for whose benefit ICWA was enacted.” (Ibid.) In
this case, we are tasked with determining whether DCFS’s
inquiry failures require the matter to be remanded. Under the
circumstances here, we find the error harmless and therefore
affirm.

1    All further undesignated statutory references are to the
Welfare and Institutions Code.

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       FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
       Because this appeal involves a challenge under ICWA, we
include only the facts relevant to that issue. Appellant W.V.
(father) is the father of child, A., born in December 2013. Father,
A.’s mother (mother), and four children (A. and her three older
half-siblings2) lived in an RV that was infested with cockroaches
and lacked running water; the children were dirty, had not been
receiving medical care, and were not enrolled in school. DCFS
detained the children on June 30, 2020, following a referral
stating that the children were living in filthy conditions and were
exposed to physical and emotional abuse.
       After the children were detained, assessments revealed
that A. had speech delays, developmental delays, and abscesses
in her teeth; she also needed glasses. The children’s caregiver
noted that the children did not understand basic hygiene
concepts such as how to shower or brush their teeth.
       DCFS filed a petition under section 300, subdivision (b),
which the court later sustained. The court ordered the children
returned to mother and father’s care with DCFS supervision and
family maintenance services. However, following a violent
domestic dispute in the presence of the children in October 2020,
as well as allegations that parents continued to medically neglect
the children and maintain an unsanitary home, the court again
ordered the children removed from parents. DCFS filed a
supplemental petition under section 387, which the court later
sustained. The children were not returned to parents’ care.
       Throughout the case, mother and father affirmatively
represented that they had no Native American heritage. DCFS

2     The half-siblings are mother’s children with different
fathers, and are not at issue in this appeal.

                                 3
noted that in a previous dependency case in 2018, the court found
ICWA did not apply. Both father and mother reported to DCFS
that they were born in Honduras. Both parents filed parental
notification of Indian status forms with the juvenile court on July
7, 2020 denying Native American ancestry. Father filed another
such form on December 3, 2020. At the detention hearing on July
7, 2020, the court noted the parents’ denials, and found that
ICWA did not apply with respect to A. At the adjudication
hearing on August 27, 2020, the juvenile court again found that
ICWA did not apply with respect to either parent.
       DCFS made no further ICWA inquiries relevant to A., and
the court made no further ICWA findings relevant to A. A CSW
spoke with mother’s adult daughter, Ana, who lived in New York
and had never met the younger children. Ana said mother left
her and her siblings in Honduras when Ana was a child. A CSW
also spoke with a woman named Vanessa who identified herself
as mother’s sister. However, Ana, mother, and a reporting party
said Vanessa was an unrelated acquaintance.3 The record does
not indicate that DCFS made any ICWA inquiries of Ana or
Vanessa.
       A CSW met with father’s adult daughter J. on November
20, 2020 to discuss placing the children with her. J. was born in
Honduras; father was not involved in her life. She immigrated to
the United States at the age of 23. J. had three children of her
own: two adults and one teenager. DCFS placed A. and her

3     The unidentified male reporter stated that Vanessa was
using the children’s social security numbers to fraudulently
receive their financial benefits. Mother also told her daughter
Ana that Vanessa had committed identity theft by taking the
children’s birth certificates and social security cards.

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minor half-siblings with J. in August 2021. J. was willing to
adopt all four children even though the three older children were
not biologically related to her. After being placed with J., the
children thrived in her care and said they wanted to stay with
her. At various times throughout the case, CSWs discussed the
children with J. and visited them at J.’s home, but the record
does not note any related ICWA inquiries.
        Mother failed to comply with the case plan, and father only
partially complied. On December 13, 2021, the juvenile court
terminated reunification services for both parents. On March 15,
2023, the court terminated mother’s and father’s parental rights
pursuant to section 366.26. The court found a permanent plan of
adoption with J. to be appropriate. Father timely appealed.
                           DISCUSSION
        Father argues that the section 366.26 ruling terminating
his parental rights must be reversed and the matter remanded
because DCFS spoke with J., Ana, and Vanessa (whom father
refers to as a “maternal aunt”) over the course of the case, but
failed to make any ICWA-related inquiries of them. We disagree
that remand is warranted.
        DCFS has an ongoing duty to ask “the child, parents, legal
guardian, Indian custodian, extended family members, others
who have an interest in the child, and the party reporting child
abuse or neglect, whether the child is, or may be, an Indian
child.” (§ 224.2, subd. (b).) A juvenile court may determine that
ICWA does not apply only after “proper and adequate” inquiry
and “due diligence as required in this section.” (§ 224.2. subd.
(i)(2).) DCFS did not meet its burden of initial inquiry here. The
only ICWA information in this case came from mother’s and
father’s own representations. DCFS noted that the juvenile court

                                 5
previously found that ICWA was not applicable, but nothing in
the record indicates what inquiries were made during those
proceedings. Moreover, DCFS spoke with extended family
members over the course of this case, including J. as she
prepared to adopt the children, and the record reflects no ICWA-
based inquiries of these family members. Thus, the court’s ICWA
findings, based on mother’s and father’s representations and
nothing more, failed to meet the requirements of section 224.2,
and constitutes error.4
       As in all appeals, however, the appellant must demonstrate
not only error, but prejudice—a miscarriage of justice under
article VI, section 13 of the California Constitution. (See, e.g., In
re J.W. (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 384, 390; In re D.B. (2022) 87
Cal.App.5th 239, 245; In re K.H. (2022) 84 Cal.App.5th 566, 589
[“reviewing courts generally agree that reversal is dependent on
showing prejudice, or a miscarriage of justice”].) Thus, “[w]here,
as here, there is no doubt that the Department’s inquiry was
erroneous, our examination as to whether substantial evidence
supports the juvenile court’s ICWA finding ends up turning on
whether that error by the Department was harmless—in other
words, we must assess whether it is reasonably probable that the
juvenile court would have made the same ICWA finding had the

4      DCFS acknowledges that under section 224.2 it had a duty
to make ICWA inquiries to extended family members and others.
Without conceding error or contending that any such error was
harmless, however, DCFS asserts that it does not matter that it
failed to inquire of extended family members under ICWA,
because both mother and father reported that they were born in
Honduras. DCFS cites no authority, and we are aware of none,
exempting the department from meeting ICWA requirements
when the child’s parents are born outside the United States.

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inquiry been done properly. [Citation.] If so, the error is
harmless and we should affirm; otherwise, we must send it back
for the Department to conduct a more comprehensive inquiry.”
(In re Dezi C. (2022) 79 Cal.App.5th 769, 777, review granted,
Sept. 21, 2022, No. S275578 (Dezi C.).)
       California appellate courts have crafted several different
tests for deciding whether a defective initial ICWA inquiry is
harmless. Until our Supreme Court provides guidance on the
matter, this division follows the reasoning of Dezi C., in which
Division Two of this district held, “[A]n agency’s failure to
conduct a proper initial inquiry into a dependent child’s
American Indian heritage is harmless unless the record contains
information suggesting a reason to believe that the child may be
an ‘Indian child’ within the meaning of ICWA, such that the
absence of further inquiry was prejudicial to the juvenile court’s
ICWA finding.” (Dezi C., supra, 79 Cal.App.5th at p. 779.)
       Here, father’s appellate briefing makes no effort to show
that DCFS’s failure to inquire was prejudicial. He cites three
cases5 for the proposition that insufficient ICWA inquiry can be
prejudicial. However, his prejudice argument regarding this case
consists of a single, conclusory sentence asserting that “the
failure to inquire of the children’s relatives regarding any Indian
ancestry was prejudicial.” DCFS’s respondent’s brief responds
nearly in kind, failing to mention the issue of prejudice
altogether.
       We find that father has not met his burden to show
prejudice or that reversal is warranted. Both parents denied

5     Father cites In re Benjamin M. (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 735,
In re A.C. (2022) 75 Cal.App.5th 1009, and In re H.V. (2022) 75
Cal.App.5th 433.

                                 7
Native American ancestry, and DCFS represented that the
juvenile court previously found ICWA inapplicable. Both parents
stated that they were born in Honduras, Ana and J. were born in
Honduras, and there is no suggestion in the record that either
parent had any connection to a “tribe, band, nation, or other
organized group or community of Indians recognized as eligible
for the services provided to Indians by the Secretary [of the
Interior] because of their status as Indians.” (25 U.S.C.
§ 1903(8); see also § 224.1, subd. (a) [adopting federal
definitions].)
      Moreover, nothing in the record suggests any reason to
believe either parent’s knowledge of their heritage was incorrect,
or that any other source would have more accurate information.
Neither father nor DCFS has proffered any additional evidence.6
(See Dezi C., supra, 79 Cal.App.5th at p. 774 [for purposes of
evaluating whether defective initial inquiry is harmless, “the
‘record’ means not only the record of proceedings before the
juvenile court but also any further proffer the appealing parent
makes on appeal”].)
      In addition, the harms ICWA was intended to address are
not at issue in this case. “ICWA was enacted to curtail ‘the
separation of large numbers of Indian children from their
families and tribes through adoption or foster care placement’”
and “‘to promote the stability and security of Indian tribes and
families.’” (Dezi C., supra, 79 Cal.App.5th at p. 780.) Here,
however, A. is placed with her half-sister, J., who is now the

6     DCFS presumably could have remedied its statutory failure
by inquiring of Ana and J., thus potentially mooting father’s
appeal and/or obviating any need for remand. DCFS did not do
so.

                                8
prospective adoptive parent. Thus, “the purpose of ICWA—to
prevent the removal of Indian children from their Indian
families—is not implicated by the juvenile court’s final
disposition.” (In re J.W. (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th 384, 390.) Such
circumstances also support a finding of harmless error. (Id. at
pp. 390-391.)
                          DISPOSITION
      The juvenile court’s order under section 366.26 is affirmed.
      NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

                      COLLINS, ACTING P. J.

We concur:

MORI, J.

ZUKIN, J.

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