Court Opinion

ID: 9948352
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-06 20:13:54.709581+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:29:28.329308
License: Public Domain

[Cite as In re M.C., 2024-Ohio-720.]

STATE OF OHIO                     )                   IN THE COURT OF APPEALS
                                  )ss:                NINTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT
COUNTY OF SUMMIT                  )

IN RE: M.C.                                           C.A. Nos.      30850
       C.C.                                                          30851

                                                      APPEAL FROM JUDGMENT
                                                      ENTERED IN THE
                                                      COURT OF COMMON PLEAS
                                                      COUNTY OF SUMMIT, OHIO
                                                      CASE Nos. DN 21 03 0194
                                                                 DN 22 02 0108

                                 DECISION AND JOURNAL ENTRY

Dated: February 28, 2024

        SUTTON, Presiding Judge.

        {¶1}     Appellant, C.M. (“Mother”), appeals from a judgment of the Summit County Court

of Common Pleas, Juvenile Division, that placed two of her minor children in the permanent

custody of Summit County Children Services Board (“CSB”). This Court affirms.

                                                 I.

        {¶2}     Mother is the biological mother of M.C., born January 25, 2021; and C.C., born

January 31, 2022. The children’s father (“Father”) voluntarily waived his right to a contested

hearing and has not appealed the permanent custody judgment.

        {¶3}     When this case began, Mother also had an open juvenile case and reunification case

plan with an older child, who is not a party to this appeal. The case plan in that case focused on

Mother addressing her problems with unstable mental health, substance abuse, and domestic

violence in the home. The older child was eventually placed in the legal custody of a relative.
                                                2

       {¶4}    Mother has a lengthy history of mental health problems that predate the birth of her

children. She had been involuntarily hospitalized numerous times for suicidal ideation and self-

harming behavior and, although she engaged in psychiatric medication management since years

before this case began, she had a history of going on and off her psychiatric medications and self-

medicating with other substances.

       {¶5}    On March 23, 2021, CSB filed a complaint to allege that M.C., then eight weeks

old, was an abused, neglected, and dependent child because, in addition to Mother’s ongoing

problems, the police had responded to an incident of domestic violence between Mother and

Father, and the infant child was in the arms of Father at the time. The juvenile court later

adjudicated M.C. as a dependent child and placed him in the temporary custody of CSB.

       {¶6}    C.C. was removed from the custody of Mother shortly after the child’s birth because

of Mother’s cases with the child’s two older siblings and her unresolved parenting problems. The

juvenile court later adjudicated C.C. dependent and placed him in the temporary custody of CSB.

       {¶7}    The case plan reunification goals for each child focused on Mother addressing her

history of mental health, substance abuse, and related domestic violence problems. During the

trial court proceedings, Mother did not consistently engage in mental health or substance abuse

treatment. Instead, she continued to exhibit erratic and violent behavior, resulting in numerous

felony and misdemeanor criminal charges and repeated involuntary hospitalizations for mental

health treatment.

       {¶8}    Because Mother failed to make substantial progress on these reunification goals,

CSB eventually moved for permanent custody of both children. Following the final dispositional

hearing, the trial court terminated parental rights and placed M.C. and C.C. in the permanent

custody of CSB. Mother appeals and raises one assignment of error.
                                                 3

                                                II.

                                  ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR

       THE TRIAL COURT ABUSED ITS DISCRETION IN ITS GRANT OF
       PERMANENT CUSTODY TO [CSB] AS SUCH DECISION WAS NOT
       SUPPORTED BY THE EVIDENCE AND WAS AGAINST THE MANIFEST
       WEIGHT OF THE EVIDENCE.

       {¶9}    Mother’s sole assignment of error is that the trial court’s permanent custody

decision was against the manifest weight of the evidence. Before a juvenile court may terminate

parental rights and award permanent custody of a child to a proper moving agency, it must find

clear and convincing evidence of both prongs of the permanent custody test: (1) that the child is

abandoned; orphaned; has been in the temporary custody of the agency for at least 12 months of a

consecutive 22-month period; the child or another child of the same parent has been adjudicated

abused, neglected, or dependent three times; or that the child cannot be placed with either parent,

based on an analysis under R.C. 2151.414(E); and (2) that the grant of permanent custody to the

agency is in the best interest of the child, based on an analysis under R.C. 2151.414(D)(1). R.C.

2151.414(B)(1) and 2151.414(B)(2); see also In re William S., 75 Ohio St.3d 95, 98-99 (1996).

Clear and convincing evidence is that which will “produce in the mind of the trier of facts a firm

belief or conviction as to the facts sought to be established.” (Internal quotations omitted.) In re

Adoption of Holcomb, 18 Ohio St.3d 361, 368 (1985), quoting Cross v. Ledford, 161 Ohio St. 469

(1954), paragraph three of the syllabus.

       {¶10} In considering whether the juvenile court’s judgment is against the manifest weight

of the evidence, this Court “weighs the evidence and all reasonable inferences, considers the

credibility of witnesses and determines whether in resolving conflicts in the evidence, the [finder

of fact] clearly lost its way and created such a manifest miscarriage of justice that the [judgment]

must be reversed and a new [hearing] ordered.” (Internal quotations and citations omitted.)
                                                 4

Eastley v. Volkman, 132 Ohio St.3d 328, 2012-Ohio-2179, ¶ 20. When weighing the evidence,

this Court “must always be mindful of the presumption in favor of the finder of fact.” Id. at ¶ 21.

       {¶11} Mother does not directly challenge the trial court’s findings on either prong of the

permanent custody test. Because this case involves the termination of Mother’s fundamental

parental rights, however, this Court will examine the evidence supporting the trial court’s findings

on each prong. See In re H.P., 9th Dist. Summit No. 30685, 2023-Ohio-3700, ¶ 16. The trial court

found that CSB established the first prong of the permanent custody test as to each child because

Mother failed to substantially remedy the conditions that caused the children to be removed from

her custody and remain placed outside the home. R.C. 2151.414(B)(1)(a); 2151.414(E)(1). That

finding was supported by substantial evidence.

       {¶12} This case began after the police responded to an incident of domestic violence

between Mother and Father. Mother’s mental health, substance abuse, domestic violence, and

criminal problems were identified as problems in the adjudication of each child and continued to

be problems for Mother throughout this case.

       {¶13} CSB referred Mother to four different service providers for combined mental health

and substance abuse counseling, but Mother was terminated by each of those providers because

she never contacted one of the agencies and did not regularly attend scheduled appointments with

the others.    Mother sporadically engaged in medication management through telehealth

appointments, but CSB remained concerned that Mother was not taking her psychiatric

medications as prescribed and/or that the medications were not stabilizing her mental health.

Furthermore, Mother received mental health treatment during several psychiatric hospitalizations,

but the caseworker had been unable to obtain any information about Mother’s diagnoses, progress,
                                                5

or recommended follow-up treatment because Mother did not sign information releases with the

hospitals.

       {¶14} By the time of the hearing, Mother was receiving sporadic mental health and

substance abuse treatment through a fifth agency that Mother apparently contacted without a

referral from CSB. A psychiatric nurse practitioner from that agency testified at the hearing

because the trial judge ordered her to do so. Prior to that time, CSB had been unable to obtain

information about Mother from this agency because Mother had refused to comply with the case

plan requirement that she sign an information release with the service provider. At the hearing,

the nurse practitioner testified that Mother had not consistently attended her scheduled

appointments.   Over a period of ten months, she had attended only four of her monthly

appointments.

       {¶15} Similarly, Mother submitted to drug screens only intermittently during this case.

Although she continually told the caseworker that she was sober, Mother frequently tested positive

for amphetamine, methamphetamine, and/or THC. After she tested positive for amphetamine,

methamphetamine, and THC during February 2023, Mother refused to submit to any further drug

tests. Evidence was presented at the hearing, however, that Mother overdosed on fentanyl two

months before the hearing, which had required hospitalization and treatment with Narcan.

       {¶16} Moreover, Mother continued to exhibit symptoms of her unstable mental health

and/or substance abuse throughout this case. On numerous occasions, police were called to

intervene into incidents involving Mother exhibiting erratic and sometimes violent behavior

toward Father and other people. CSB presented evidence regarding some of these incidents

through the testimony of police officers who were dispatched to incidents involving Mother on

four separate dates during this case: May 8, 2022; September 24, 2022; March 4, 2023; and June
                                                  6

24, 2023. In addition to the testimony of each police officer, CSB played video footage from their

body cameras, which depicted some of the interactions between Mother and police officers during

each incident.

       {¶17} The incident on May 8, 2022, involved several officers from the Cuyahoga Falls

Police Department responding to a call about Mother assaulting a woman at a park by banging the

woman’s head into a picnic table. Through the testimony of one police officer and his body camera

video, the following basic details about the incident were admitted into evidence. Mother’s

hostility toward the woman apparently arose when Mother arrived at the park to meet Father and

saw him talking to this woman. When the officer arrived, the woman, Mother, and Father were

standing in separate parts of a grassy area in the park. The officer, who was familiar with Mother

and Father from prior incidents, briefly spoke to the woman and then approached Mother, who

immediately became upset and denied that she had touched the woman. The officer handcuffed

Mother and placed her in the back of his cruiser while he and other officers spoke to Father and

the woman about the incident. Based on similar statements from Father and the woman, the

officers determined that Mother would be arrested and charged for assaulting the woman.

       {¶18} After the officer informed Mother that she would be arrested, she became agitated

and responded by trying to kick the officers and by banging her head into the cruiser. The officers

tried to calm Mother down, but she only became more agitated and began repeatedly expressing a

desire to kill herself. The testifying officer transported Mother to a hospital for an involuntary 72-

hour psychiatric admission. On the way to the hospital, Mother continued to attempt to harm

herself by striking herself in the face with her handcuffed wrists. When they arrived at the hospital,

Mother’s face was bloody from the injuries she had inflicted on herself.
                                                7

       {¶19} Mother was admitted to the hospital and charged with a felony assault count as well

as resisting arrest. The testifying officer explained at the permanent custody hearing that he been

involved in “at least a dozen” similar encounters with Mother and that each had involved the same

“pattern of behavior” of Mother responding to police officers in a hostile and violent manner.

       {¶20} The incident on September 24, 2022, involved several different Cuyahoga Falls

police officers responding to a call from Father about Mother’s erratic behavior at their home and

an alleged incident of domestic violence. When the testifying officer arrived at the scene, Mother

was outside the house screaming and crying. She informed him that Father had hit and harmed

her three days earlier and that, on the current date, she and Father had each perpetrated violence

against the other with a pair of scissors. This officer also testified that he had responded to

numerous domestic incidents between Mother and Father. His testimony and his body camera

video further revealed that several officers responded to the scene, who spoke to Father and

Mother. Father showed another officer a video that he had recorded on his phone during the

incident, and the officer concluded that the video depicted Mother as the primary aggressor. Father

told the police that he did not want Mother charged, but they decided to charge her based on the

video that they had seen.

       {¶21} After the police informed Mother that she would be arrested and charged, Mother

exhibited a similar response to her behavior at her arrest on May 8. She physically resisted the

officers’ attempts to restrain her, became increasingly combative, started trying to harm herself,

and repeatedly threatened to kill herself. Ultimately, EMS responded to the scene, restrained

Mother on a gurney, and transported her to the hospital for psychiatric treatment.

       {¶22} The incident on March 4, 2023, involved the Cuyahoga Falls Police responding to

another location in an apartment building because 911 dispatch had received a hang up call and
                                                 8

sent the police to evaluate the situation. Some of the responding officers were also familiar with

Mother and the man named John who lived in the apartment. After receiving no response to their

knocks at the apartment door, they found John outside the apartment building and spoke to him.

While speaking to John, the police observed Mother run across the parking lot. The testifying

officer opined that Mother had run because there were numerous warrants out for her arrest.

       {¶23} As explained through his testimony and depicted on his body camera video, the

officer chased and caught up to Mother and noted that she smelled of alcohol. When he asked her

how much she had had to drink, Mother responded, “a lot.” While two officers tried to question

Mother, she responded by kicking, spitting, and attempting to bite them. As the officers tried to

get Mother into the back of a cruiser, she continued to resist their efforts to restrain her, and the

police officers were unable to get her into the cruiser. Mother bashed her head into the cruiser,

repeatedly threatened to kill herself, and became inconsolable. EMS responded to the scene to

restrain Mother to a gurney and transport her to the hospital for psychiatric treatment.

       {¶24} The incident on June 24, 2023, occurred in Akron, where Mother was then living.

The officer who testified and recorded the incident on his body camera explained that Akron Police

responded to the scene of a reported physical altercation and received contradictory statements

from witnesses there. Mother explained that she had stabbed a man who attempted to break into

her home. The man who had been stabbed informed the police that Mother had stabbed him after

they had an argument inside the home, and he tried to leave. The initial police investigation

revealed a large pool of blood on the porch, steps, and sidewalk at the front of the home and a

blood trail leading to the man’s vehicle. After assessing the witness statements and the blood trail,

the officers decided to arrest Mother and charge her with felonious assault.
                                                  9

       {¶25} The officers informed Mother that she would be charged and placed her in a police

cruiser. Mother responded with physical resistance, repeated statements that she did not want to

live, and she started bashing her head inside the police cruiser. The officers removed Mother from

the cruiser, restrained her in a “wrap system” to minimize the harm she could cause herself, and

transported her to Summit County Jail. Mother again caused her face to be bloodied by banging

her head inside the cruiser.

       {¶26} It is not clear from the record whether Mother received psychiatric treatment after

this June 23 incident. The caseworker briefly testified that Mother was again involuntarily

hospitalized for psychiatric treatment during May and June 2023, but she did not give the specific

dates of those hospitalizations. Moreover, on the day of the hearing in July 2023, the caseworker

further testified that she had just learned that Mother had been released “yesterday” from another

psychiatric hospitalization and was then transported to the Summit County Jail.

       {¶27} The evidence CSB presented at the permanent custody hearing clearly established

that Mother had not substantially remedied the parenting problems that caused her children to be

removed and remain placed outside her home. See R.C. 2151.414(E)(1). By the time of the

hearing, Mother had been provided with reunification services for more than two years but had

failed to consistently avail herself of those services and had not made progress on any of the

reunification goals of the case plan. Therefore, the record supports the trial court’s finding on the

first prong of the permanent custody test.

       {¶28} Next, the trial court found that permanent custody was in the best interest of these

children. In reviewing the trial court’s determination that permanent custody was in the best

interest of M.C. and C.C., this Court focuses primarily on the best interest factors set forth in R.C.

2151.414(D). In re M.S., 9th Dist. Summit Nos. 30506 and 30515, 2023-Ohio-1558, ¶ 25. In
                                                 10

making its best interest determination, the trial court was required to consider the statutory best

interest factors, which include: the interaction and interrelationships of the children, their wishes,

the custodial history of the children, their need for permanence and whether that can be achieved

without a grant of permanent custody, and whether any of the factors outlined in R.C.

2151.414(E)(7)-(11) apply.1 R.C. 2151.414(D)(1)(a)-(e); see In re R.G., 9th Dist. Summit Nos.

24834 and 24850, 2009-Ohio-6284, ¶ 11.

       {¶29} During most of this case, Mother’s interaction with the children was limited to

supervised visitation because Mother failed to stabilize her mental health or substance abuse

problems. The caseworker testified that Mother interacted well with both children during the visits

and that she observed a bond between Mother and each child. Mother’s attendance at visits

throughout this case had been sporadic, however. Mother initially had visits scheduled twice a

week, but her scheduled visits were later reduced to once a week because she attended only 13 of

31 scheduled visits.

       {¶30} Moreover, the overriding concern in this case was the lack of stability with

Mother’s mental health and behavior, which, based on the record, seemed to worsen during this

case. By the hearing in July 2023, Mother had not made progress toward stabilizing her mental

health or her substance abuse problems and she was potentially facing significant terms of

incarceration, as multiple felony and misdemeanor criminal charges were still pending against her.

       {¶31} The children in this case were too young to express their wishes, so the guardian ad

litem spoke on their behalf. She opined that permanent custody was in their best interest because

Mother had not stabilized her mental health or taken significant steps toward achieving sobriety.

       1
          CSB did not allege, and the trial court did not find, that any of those provisions applied
to the facts of this case.
                                                 11

She testified that she had been with the caseworker once when Mother appeared to be under the

influence of some substance but refused the caseworker’s request that she submit to an oral swab.

The guardian ad litem expressed concern that Mother had completely stopped submitting to drug

tests during this case and that she had recently overdosed on fentanyl.

       {¶32} By the time of the hearing, the case involving M.C. had been pending for well over

two years. M.C. had been in the temporary custody of CSB for most of his life and C.C. had been

in the agency’s temporary custody for all his young life. Both children needed a legally secure

permanent placement, and neither parent was prepared to provide them with that stability. CSB

had been unable to find any suitable relatives who were willing and able to do so, so the trial court

concluded that a legally secure permanent placement would be achieved by placing the children

in the permanent custody of CSB.

       {¶33} This Court’s review of the record fails to demonstrate that the trial court lost it way

in terminating Mother’s parental rights and placing M.C. and C.C. in the permanent custody of

CSB. See Eastley at ¶ 20. Mother’s assignment of error is overruled.

                                                III.

       {¶34} Mother’s assignment of error is overruled. The judgment of the Summit County

Court of Common Pleas, Juvenile Division, is affirmed.

                                                                                Judgment affirmed.

       There were reasonable grounds for this appeal.
                                                12

       We order that a special mandate issue out of this Court, directing the Court of Common

Pleas, County of Summit, State of Ohio, to carry this judgment into execution. A certified copy

of this journal entry shall constitute the mandate, pursuant to App.R. 27.

       Immediately upon the filing hereof, this document shall constitute the journal entry of

judgment, and it shall be file stamped by the Clerk of the Court of Appeals at which time the period

for review shall begin to run. App.R. 22(C). The Clerk of the Court of Appeals is instructed to

mail a notice of entry of this judgment to the parties and to make a notation of the mailing in the

docket, pursuant to App.R. 30.

       Costs taxed to Appellant.

                                                     BETTY SUTTON
                                                     FOR THE COURT

CARR, J.
CONCURS.

FLAGG LANZINGER, J.
CONCURS IN JUDGMENT ONLY.

APPEARANCES:

THOMAS C. LOEPP, Attorney at Law, for Appellant.

SHERRI BEVAN WALSH, Prosecuting Attorney, and HEAVEN R. DIMARTINO, Assistant
Prosecuting Attorney, for Appellee.