Court Opinion

ID: 9902429
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-27 14:02:26.198041+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:21:51.263996
License: Public Domain

FIRST DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
                 STATE OF FLORIDA
                 _____________________________

                       No. 1D2023-0129
                 _____________________________

J.M., mother of K.M. and A.M.,
minor children,

    Appellant,

    v.

DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND
FAMILIES,

    Appellee.
                 _____________________________

On appeal from the Circuit Court for Columbia County.
Leandra G. Johnson, Judge.

                        November 27, 2023

TANENBAUM, J.

     A mother appeals a final order terminating her rights to be a
parent to her two children, K.M. and A.M. (“TPR”). She couches
her appeal in terms of evidentiary sufficiency. The thrust of her
argument for reversal, however, is that the trial court essentially
engaged in what she characterizes as improper “victim shaming.”
She contends that the termination came as a direct consequence of
her having contact with the abusive father in the presence of their
children after being ordered by the trial court not to, but that she
was not warned of this consequence. The trial court, however, did
not consider the department’s petition in a vacuum. In fact, it had
available to it several years of experience with the two parents as
they tried to progress through a case plan. Despite her completion
of the case plan and reunification with her children based on her
apparent development of protective capacities, there was sufficient
evidence before the trial court to support its determination that
she continued to pose a danger to her children. It was for that
reason the trial court terminated her parental rights. We reject her
argument and affirm. *

     To place the TPR in context, we must go back to 2019, when
the underlying proceeding began upon the department’s filing of a
shelter petition. The premise of the petition was the children’s
repeated exposure to a swirling combination of domestic violence,
mental health issues, and substance abuse while living with both
their parents in a camper. It all came to a head one night when the
children were present for a physical altercation between the
parents—just the latest in a series of domestic violence incidents
requiring police intervention. On that night after the police
responded, the father threatened self-harm and was committed
under the Baker Act.

     The children’s shelter and dependency adjudication rested on
the readily apparent volatile relationship between the couple. The
father struggled with substance abuse, previously had been
committed under the Baker Act, and tended to have frequent,

    *  The mother also contends that termination under the
circumstances was not the “least restrictive means of protecting
the children from harm,” under the circumstances. She
misunderstands how that query works. See P.B. v. Fla. Dep’t of
Child. & Fams., 335 So. 3d 804, 807–08 (Fla. 1st DCA 2022)
(explaining that “‘[l]east restrictive means’ refers specifically to
‘what actions were taken by the State before filing the petition to
terminate the parent’s rights,’” and “is a retrospective query that
considers what DCF already did to salvage safely the parent-child
relationship prior to its filing of the TPR petition” (quoting S.M. v.
Fla. Dep’t of Child. & Fams., 202 So. 3d 769, 778 (Fla. 2016))).
Because the department already had provided a case plan, which
the mother completed, and reunification had been achieved once,
we can find no due-process deficiency in this respect. See Padgett
v. Dep’t of Health & Rehab. Servs., 577 So. 2d 565, 571 (Fla. 1991).

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unpredictable, violent outbursts while the children were present.
The mother, meanwhile, showed an inability to control him or
protect the kids from that exposure. She also struggled with
mental health issues of her own, herself having been committed
under the Baker Act following an incident in the back of a police
cruiser where she repeatedly beat her head on the partition until
she drew blood. It seemed that the mother’s mental health issues
were exacerbated by the father’s behavior.

     To address these issues, the department provided both
parents with a case plan, recommending reunification as the
ultimate goal. Issues to be addressed for the mother included
learning how to control her mental health, developing plans to
provide for the children’s safety, and keeping the home safe from
abuse, neglect, and domestic violence. By October 2020, the mother
had not reached substantial compliance with the case plan, and
the department recommended that the case plan be changed to add
adoption as a goal. Instead, the case plan was extended. Eight
months later, in June 2021, the department filed its first TPR
petition. Though a hearing date was set, DCF withdrew its petition
prior to the hearing.

     Things turned around for a bit after the father began
addressing his substance abuse. Eventually, the family care
counselor assigned to the case concluded that both parents had
“enhanced their protective capacities.” That improvement
convinced the counselor that both parents had “changed their
behavior” and should be reunified with the children. Both parents
were reunified with the children in February 2022. In the initial
weeks after reunification, the children and parents were adjusting
well and there were no reportable issues. Subsequent visits,
however, revealed that the father had relapsed into substance
abuse. This use resulted in the counselor and the mother
implementing further safety plans to protect the children. The
father decided to move out of the camper to protect the kids from
his continued drug use. His move did not last long, and he shortly
moved back into the home. Verbal and physical altercations
resumed between the parents.

    Concerned for the safety of the children, the mother sought
and obtained a domestic-violence injunction against the father.

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The trial court, of course, was aware of the family history and
specifically directed the mother not to have contact with the
father—meaning she could not be the one supervising the
children’s visits with the father under the ongoing effort at
reunification. Shortly thereafter, though, the mother was caught
bringing the children to the father and being with him in the kids’
presence. The mother later testified about this as follows:

    Q Okay. And do you recall that the judge specifically said
    no interaction between the two of you?

    A I do. I do.

    Q Don’t contact him. He doesn’t contact you. You recall
    all of that?

    A I do.

    ***

    It wasn’t, other than the fact that no matter what
    happens between us, he’s always going to be their father.
    And I feel that if I could provide just a little bit of
    administrative, you know, the secretarial duties to help
    get him somewhere when he's finally, after 30 years,
    asking for help, my kids deserve that.

     The department filed a second TPR petition, and after an
evidentiary hearing, the trial court rendered the TPR order that is
on review now. Contrary to the mother’s characterization, the
order was not to shame her or punish her for disobeying a direct
order from the court. Instead, the trial court found that despite the
mother having appeared to develop an ability to recognize the cycle
of abuse, power, and control and to articulate a plan of action in
response to future violent acts—sufficiently, in fact, to justify
reunification—after obtaining the then-recent domestic violence
injunction, she still “chose to place [the children] at risk of
exposure to domestic violence.” The trial court also noted that the
mother then sought to keep it from finding out that she had had
contact with the father in the presence of the kids. The trial court
determined that the mother “continued [to exhibit] impulsive
behaviors that are significantly likely to expose these children to

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domestic violence.” It concluded that the circumstances that
prompted the shelter and dependency in the first place, as it
turned out, had “not been remedied” after all, despite all the
services provided.

    There was testimony to support this determination. The
counselor who had been working with the mother and originally
recommended reunification, explained as follows:

    [The mother], you know, we had had the conversations
    that [the father] was going to make [her] choose either
    him or the children, that, you know, because of his
    behaviors, there was no way that they could continue
    together in a relationship and have the children together,
    because it was just a chaotic, unsafe environment when
    they were together.

    ***

    On 6/21 is when [the mother] got the injunction, and I
    actually sat with [her] and the kids at the park all day
    that day while she was waiting on the injunction. And
    had the conversation with her that, you know, she made
    the decision and felt that it was significant enough to get
    and seek an injunction for safety against him, that there
    was no going back now; that she could not have contact
    with him and keep her children; that she had to choose to
    either protect herself and the children or help [the
    father]. And she understood at that point that she had to
    make the decision for her and her children to, to be away
    from [the father] until he figured out, himself, how to get
    help on his own, and clear himself up from the substances
    and the violence. And she told me that day that she was
    just tired of the kids hearing him call her derogatory
    terms, yelling, them cussing and yelling at each other.
    And I told her, I said, You’re absolutely right, you know,
    the kids should not be subject-subjected to that. And now
    you've made this step and you know what the
    consequences are. You know, you guys cannot keep them
    safe together.

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    The counselor explained her          recommendation      for
termination from there, as follows:

    So my recommendation on that was I felt that neither one
    of the parents was going to recognize how toxic their
    relationship was together and, and follow — I mean,
    because now we even have a blatant court order that says
    they are not to have contact and they're still having
    contact. So, you know, that they could make those
    decisions on their own to stay away from each other for
    the protection of the kids, I did not feel they would be able
    to do, because even a court order, you know, somebody
    else telling them you are not allowed to be together, they
    were still violating that, despite the injunction.

      The trial court determined that there was clear and
convincing evidence establishing both the statutory grounds for
termination alleged in the petition, but we need only focus on one.
See § 39.802(4)(a), Fla. Stat. (“A petition for termination of
parental rights filed under this chapter must contain facts
supporting the following allegations: That at least one of the
grounds listed in s. 39.806 has been met.”). The trial court
determined that there was clear and convincing evidence to
support termination pursuant to section 39.806(1)(c), Florida
Statutes, which provides for termination when “the parent or
parents engaged in conduct toward the child or toward other
children that demonstrates that the continuing involvement of the
parent or parents in the parent-child relationship threatens the
life, safety, well-being, or physical, mental, or emotional health of
the child irrespective of the provision of services.” The trial court
supported its conclusion by finding that the conditions that had led
to the creation of the placement and case plan had not been
rectified, and that due to the mother’s continued behavior, any
return to the home would be detrimental to the children. There
was ample evidence to support this determination, and we are not
here to second-guess the trial court’s assessment of all the history
and circumstances that led the mother to that point in the
proceeding.

    Before closing, we offer one remark on the mother’s argument
that she was not sufficiently warned of the consequences of her

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disobeying the trial court’s directive to avoid contact with the
father in front of the children. Her argument treats the TPR as if
it is a punishment for her conduct. That is not what these
proceedings are about. The focus of chapter 39 (inclusive of both
dependency and TPR proceedings) is not the best interests of the
parent or the correction of a parent’s bad behavior. From beginning
to end, proceedings under chapter 39 are centered on the
protection and welfare of the child, balanced against the right of a
parent to be a parent to that child. See § 39.001(1), Fla. Stat.
(enumerating the purposes of the chapter, all of which focus on the
“care, safety, and protection of children” and to prevent
abandonment, abuse, and neglect); cf. Noeling v. State, 87 So. 2d
593, 598 (Fla. 1956) (“We cannot overlook the fact that although
the welfare of the juvenile is the guiding star that leads the Judge
to his conclusion, nevertheless, the natural right of a parent is not
to be lightly regarded.”); In re Camm, 294 So. 2d 318, 320 (Fla.
1974) (“While Florida courts have recognized the ‘God-given right’
of parents to the care, custody and companionship of their
children, it has been held repeatedly that the right is not absolute
but is subject to the overriding principle that it is the ultimate
welfare or best interest of the child which must prevail.”).

     The trial court’s evidence-supported TPR findings were
commensurate with this focus on the children’s well-being, and
they must be considered in the context of the historical mosaic for
this family demonstrated by the entire record of this multi-year
proceeding. We find no legal error in the trial court’s TPR based,
at a minimum, on the ground stated in section 39.806(1)(c). The
mother does not challenge the trial court’s findings supporting its
conclusion that TPR is in the manifest best interests of the
children, so we do not review the sufficiency of that determination.
See §§ 39.802(4)(c), 39.810, Fla. Stat. As we stated in the margin
at the beginning, least-restrictive means is not at issue either,
because a case plan previously had been provided. The mother
otherwise had notice and an opportunity to be heard, so she has
been afforded the process constitutionally due her.

    AFFIRMED.

BILBREY and NORDBY, JJ., concur.

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                 _____________________________

    Not final until disposition of any timely and
    authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or
    9.331.
               _____________________________

Valarie Linnen, Jacksonville, for Appellant.

Carolyn Schwarz, Children’s Legal Services, Fort Lauderdale, for
Appellee Department Children and Families.

Sara Goldfarb and Lucy Wiggins Hoover, Tallahassee, for Appellee
Guardian Ad Litem.

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