County of Orange v. Carl D
| Decision Date | 24 November 1999 |
| Docket Number | No. G021739.,G021739. |
| Citation | 90 Cal.Rptr.2d 440,76 Cal.App.4th 429 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | COUNTY OF ORANGE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. CARL D., Defendant and Appellant. |
Elder & Manning and David P. Elder, Tustin, for Defendant and Appellant.
Michael R. Capizzi and Anthony Rackauckas, District Attorneys, Walter D. Germond, Deputy District Attorney, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
A father spent 11 years fruitlessly searching for his children, who were abducted and concealed by the mother, a drug abuser. The children ultimately ended up in foster care, receiving public assistance benefits. But the same public entity that said the father could not be located for purposes of the dependency proceedings managed to track him down to garnish his wages for benefits paid while the children were on welfare. Regrettably, it was more interested in pursuing this father as a deadbeat dad than in helping him to function as a real one. The county is estopped by its own affirmative misrepresentations from recouping public assistance payments that need never have been made at all.
Plaintiff Carl D., a serviceman in the Navy, married Denise D. in 1984. They already were the parents of three girls, Jennifer, born in March 1982, and twins, Carla and Christina, born in February 1983. Upon his discharge Carl and his family moved to North Carolina, where he began working for a plumbing company in May 1984. A few months later, Carl returned home from work to find Denise and the girls had vanished. The spouses had argued that morning regarding Denise's plan to buy recreational drugs.
For the next 11 years, Carl futilely hunted for his family. He said neither local law enforcement nor local social welfare agencies were interested in helping him. He searched through telephone books and utility records and attempted to contact Denise's family, but to no avail.
Although he remained legally married to Denise, Carl fathered a son with another woman in 1986, ultimately gaining legal and physical custody. In 1990, he moved to Sonoma County, where his father lived.
Unknown to Carl, Denise and the three girls first moved to Arizona, where she began a new romantic relationship. Around 1986, they came to California. In March 1990, dependency proceedings were initiated in Los Angeles County based on allegations that Denise had physically abused the children. She informed social workers she did not know Carl's birth date, social security number, or the location of any of his family or friends, and that she had neither seen nor heard from him since leaving North Carolina.
In February 1992, Denise and her boyfriend were arrested in Newport Beach for commercial burglary. The children were nearby in the car. Denise, who was under the influence of methamphetamines, was incarcerated. A supplemental petition was sustained, and the children were placed in foster care. In March 1993, dependency jurisdiction was transferred to Orange County.
In June 1993, the children began receiving welfare assistance, and the Orange County Social Services Agency (SSA) made a referral to the district attorney's child support unit. Within a month the district attorney requested help from the California Parent Locator Service to find Carl. In August 1993, the Department of Motor Vehicles reported he had a mailbox in Sonoma.
Despite this information, on October 20, 1993, SSA filed a supplemental court report in conjunction with the juvenile court's periodic review, stating, "CARL [D.] (FATHER) [¶] WHEREABOUTS UNKNOWN." The report further indicated, Based on this assertion, the court did not notify Carl of the periodic review or its continuing supervision of the children in foster care.
In March 1994, the postal service informed the district attorney of the street address for Carl's residence. A month later SSA submitted a supplemental court report in conjunction with the periodic review hearing on April 27, 1994. The report again asserted as to Carl: "Whereabouts unknown." The absent parent search activity repeated SSA's earlier conclusion that "[t]here was no possibility to pursue the subject further." SSA filed additional reports in October 1994 and April 1995 making the same boilerplate assertions regarding Carl's unknown whereabouts and its inability to obtain further information.
On July 7, 1995, some 16 months after acquiring knowledge of Carl's address, the district attorney filed the instant petition to declare Carl the father of the 3 children and for reimbursement of public assistance expended since June 1993. (Welf. & Inst.Code, §§ 11350, 11350.1, 11475.1.) Carl asserts this was the first he learned of the whereabouts of Denise and the children:
On August 28, 1995, Carl contacted SSA and told the social worker "he has been searching for the three girls for quite some time and is interested in doing what is necessary to reunify with the three girls." Visitations were arranged, and SSA scheduled a home study and evaluation of Carl's Sonoma County residence. No interim changes were made in the children's custody or status, and they continued to receive welfare benefits.
Carla and Christina were reunited with Carl in November 1995, and Jennifer moved in with him a month later to what SSA reported was a "nurturing, caring home atmosphere." He divorced Denise in January 1996 and remarried. Dependency jurisdiction was terminated on January 27, 1997.
The instant action for reimbursement was tried on a 12-page declaration from Carl, a 2-page declaration from his attorney and a 2-page declaration from a deputy district attorney. There was no live testimony.1
The court issued a lengthy statement of decision, in which it found that Carl was a "nonwilling `absent' parent." Although the court noted the district attorney's office offered no explanation for its failure to file the instant action in March 1994 "when the Family Support Division of the District Attorney's Office had secured a presumably valid address for Respondent," it speculated the delay could have been caused by "bureaucratic overload." The judge refused to consider any issues regarding the county's "wrongfulness" because Carl failed to present any controlling authority that the county had a duty to locate him.
The court concluded, Applying the statewide uniform guidelines for child support, the court ordered Carl to pay the county a total payment of $15,975, covering the period from March 1994 until mid-December 1995. Carl has appealed the order, contending the county intended to obstruct his reunification with the children and willfully concealed his children from him "so that the COUNTY could charge him money for keeping his children."2
The trial court's ruling was correct as far as it went. Carl's children were secreted by his wife, not the county, which is entitled to reimbursement for benefits paid while he did not support them. This issue has been resolved by the Supreme Court in In re Marriage of Comer (1996) 14 Cal.4th 504, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d 155, 927 P.2d 265.
But there is a significant difference between this case and Comer. No dependency proceedings were at issue in Comer. Here, in contrast, the county had a due process obligation to notify Carl of the pending dependency proceedings. Despite this, its absent parent search declaration misrepresented information within the county's actual possession regarding Carl's known whereabouts. All elements for an estoppel against the government are present, and its application is fully consistent with the public policy principles espoused in Comer.
One of the least controversial aspects of the welfare system is the requirement that absent parents (generally absent fathers) reimburse governments for welfare costs paid to the custodial parent (generally the mother) during the time the children were abandoned or deserted. (Welf. & Inst.Code, § 11350; Clark v. Superior Court, supra, 62 Cal.App.4th at pp. 578, 580, 73 Cal.Rptr.2d 53; City and County of San Francisco v. Funches, supra, 75 Cal.App.4th 243, 89 Cal.Rptr.2d 49.) There is a three-year statute of limitations. (City and County of San Francisco v. Thompson (1985) 172 Cal.App.3d 652, 659, 218 Cal.Rptr. 445.)
While this obligation has its genesis in the moral reprehension of deadbeat parents, its application is much broader. Liability is not necessarily based upon fault or wrongdoing; absent parents may be obliged to pay even where their former or current spouse deliberately concealed the child in violation of a court order. (In re Marriage of Comer, supra, 14 Cal.4th 504, 59 Cal.Rptr.2d 155, 927 P.2d 265.) The rationale, "quite plainly, was to recoup welfare costs from the absent parents of children being given public assistance." (Clark v. Superior Court, supra, 62 Cal. App.4th at p. 579, 73 Cal.Rptr.2d 53.)
In Comer a divorced father was deliberately kept away from his children for more than seven years by the mother, who had remarried, hiding her new identity and location. Like Carl, the father could not afford to hire a private investigator. Nonetheless, the Supreme Court held the county was entitled to reimbursement under the "responsible relative statutes," even though the father never knew where the children were or that they were receiving AFDC (Aid to Families With Dependent Children) benefits. The...
To continue reading
Request your trial