Court Opinion

ID: 9884468
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-06 02:58:26.962849+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:48:38.698268
License: Public Domain

KLAPHAKE, Judge
(dissenting).
I would not reverse.
I agree with the majority that Hennepin County (County) demonstrated Janet Ost-lund’s consistent pattern of abuse toward her adopted daughter. However, I disagree with the conclusion that this pattern *659renders Ostlund unable to care for M.D.O. for the reasonably foreseeable future or renders her palpably unfit to parent.
The juvenile court found that Ostlund was observed to exhibit good parenting skills during her numerous supervised visits with M.D.O. The court also found that mother and child had established “a warm bonded relationship.” More significantly, the court found Ostlund had shown “a marked propensity to take advantage of and profit from” the therapy and counseling programs available to her, including parenting classes. The trial court concluded that the County failed to establish by clear and convincing evidence that “any potential abuse by respondent [Ostlund] is expected to remain a problem for a prolonged, indeterminate period of time.”
Although Ostlund was incarcerated at the time of the termination hearing, Minnesota courts have consistently held that incarceration alone is not enough to warrant termination of that person’s parental rights. See In re Welfare of Staat, 287 Minn. 501, 505, 178 N.W.2d 709, 712-13 (1970); In re Welfare of B.C., 356 N.W.2d 328, 331 (Minn.Ct.App.1984).
Unlike the parents in In re Welfare of Clausen, 289 N.W.2d 153, 156 (Minn.1980), cited by the majority, Ostlund has not failed to undertake therapy under the direction of the court. Significantly, the termination of parental rights in that case proceeded after the juvenile court had determined the child was neglected or dependent and that all reasonable efforts under the direction of the court had failed to correct the conditions leading to the determination. Here, the County dismissed the neglect and dependency petitions and proceeded directly with a petition to terminate parental rights. A court-directed rehabilitation program was never established. The only “rehabilitation program” Ostlund failed was one unilaterally established by the County. In fact, it was less of a plan designed to reunite Ostlund and M.D.O. than to obtain an admission of guilt from Ostlund while she was exhausting her appeal rights. In addition, a psychiatrist, two licensed consulting psychologists and Dr. ten Bensel testified that in this ease an admission of guilt was not a necessary first step for the receipt of therapy. The majority’s conclusion that under these circumstances Ostlund cannot undergo sufficiently effective therapy to achieve rehabilitation is unwarranted.
Only one previous appellate case in this state has ordered termination of parental rights. In re Welfare of C.K., 434 N.W.2d 925 (Minn.1989). That case decided by the Minnesota Supreme Court came only after a remand to the trial court for further proceedings. It involved a'prior dependency and neglect adjudication and a court-ordered case plan. The facts there included abuse by both parents of all of the children involved in the termination. The children had been in foster care for four years. Forty different juvenile orders had been issued. The abuse included placing of chains around the necks of the children while requiring them to stand on a stool, threatening to kick the stools out from under them, hanging a child from a belt and chain, holding a knife to a child’s throat, beating children with belts, placing of children outside without clothes in minus eighty degree windchill and sexual abuse. There rehabilitative efforts had failed because of absconding from initial treatment and a total failure to address the sexual abuse issue at the end of a six month treatment program. There, a long history of chemical dependency had not been addressed. The facts here don’t approach those in C.K.
This is not a situation demanding immediate termination of parental rights. M.D.O. is not languishing in foster care since M.D.O. is currently living with his father. The majority’s decision in my view is an unwarranted rush to judgment.