Doe v. Doe (In re Doe)
| Decision Date | 19 September 2022 |
| Docket Number | Docket No. 49529 |
| Citation | 517 P.3d 830 |
| Parties | In the MATTER OF: John DOE II, a Child Under Eighteen (18) Years of Age. Jane Doe I and John Doe I, Petitioners-Respondents, v. John Doe II (2022-06), Respondent-Appellant. |
| Court | Idaho Supreme Court |
Erika Lessing, PLLC, Idaho Falls, for Appellant. Erika Lessing argued.
Murray Ziel & Johnston, PLLC, Idaho Falls, for Respondents. Alan Johnston argued.
In this appeal, we consider the due process rights of an unwed biological father who had established a relationship with his two-month-old child through frequent visits before the child's maternal grandfather filed a petition to adopt the child. Under Idaho Code sections 16-1504 and 16-1513, the magistrate court determined that the grandfather's filing of the adoption petition permanently and irrevocably barred the father from establishing paternity or objecting to the adoption. We vacate the decision of the magistrate court because the father's relationship with his child may have been sufficient to confer parental rights protected by the due process provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and the statutes relied upon in the magistrate court's decision unconstitutionally risk termination of these rights without due process.
Jane Doe I (Mother) and John Doe (Father) began dating in 2019. Mother became pregnant in June or July 2020 while they were living together in Pocatello, Idaho. Father was aware of the pregnancy. The two broke up in August 2020, and Mother moved in with her parents in Ammon, Idaho. Mother gave birth to John Doe II (Baby Doe) in late February 2021.
Mother stated in an affidavit that she did not want Father involved in Baby Doe's life as long as he drank alcohol and used marijuana. However, Mother allowed Father to attend some prenatal appointments, including one after the couple had broken up at which Baby Doe's gender was revealed. Father was not present when Baby Doe was born, but Mother informed Father of the birth and told Father that he could visit Baby Doe once she was home from the hospital. Father first visited Baby Doe on March 2, 2021. On twelve occasions over the next eight weeks, Father drove from Pocatello to Ammon, about an hour's drive, to visit with and hold Baby Doe. Each visit lasted about an hour.
On April 5, 2021, Mother and her father ("Grandfather") filed an adoption petition requesting that Grandfather be declared a legal parent of Baby Doe. Mother did not seek to relinquish her own parental rights; thus, if the petition were granted, Baby Doe's two legal parents would be Grandfather and Mother. Mother and Grandfather did not name Father as a party interested in the adoption proceeding and he was not served with notice of the petition. Unaware of the adoption proceedings, Father filed a petition to establish paternity on April 23, 2021, and registered notice of his paternity action with the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare (IDHW) four days later. Shortly after Mother became aware of Father's paternity action, she stopped allowing Father to visit Baby Doe and she did not tell him about the adoption proceeding.
After Mother's counsel informed Father's counsel of the pending adoption petition, Father sought an emergency stay of the adoption proceeding in early May. The stay was granted, and the adoption case and the paternity case were consolidated.
Mother moved to dismiss the paternity petition in late May, arguing that under Idaho Code section 16-1513, Father was barred from maintaining a paternity action by the filing of the adoption petition. Father responded with a motion to strike Mother's motion to dismiss for purported procedural irregularities. At a hearing, the magistrate court declined to consider either party's motion, explaining that it preferred to order genetic testing to determine whether further proceedings were warranted. In early August, a DNA test confirmed that Father is the biological parent of Baby Doe.
In late August, Father responded to the substance of Mother's motion to dismiss his paternity action. He argued the filing of the adoption petition did not preempt him from establishing paternity because the petition contained certain errors and was filed in bad faith. This echoed arguments Father had made in a separate motion to dismiss the adoption petition, filed one day earlier. Mother responded to both motions by acknowledging the petition contained minor errors but disputing that those errors had any effect on the petition's validity. In the event the magistrate court disagreed, however, she sought leave to amend and attached an amended petition to her response.
The magistrate court held a hearing in early September, after which it ordered the parties to submit supplemental briefing, addressing: the applicability of various equitable doctrines to the facts of the case, and the constitutionality of Idaho's adoption and paternity statutes. In addition, the magistrate court sought briefing on several other topics.
The magistrate court issued a decision in late December 2021 dismissing Father's paternity petition pursuant to Idaho Code sections 16-1504 and 16-1513. The magistrate court held it was irrelevant under the adoption statutes whether Father wanted to or was prepared to fulfill parental responsibilities.
It also held it was irrelevant that the adoption of Baby Doe by Grandfather was an action that "on its face appears to be taken simply as a means to eliminate [Father] from being part of the child's life because [Mother] does not agree with [Father]’s lifestyle choices." Instead, because Father was not married to Mother when Baby Doe was born, the only relevant fact was whether Father had (1) filed a paternity action, (2) filed a notice of that action with IDHW, and (3) paid a reasonable portion of certain costs incurred by Mother, all before the adoption petition was filed. Because Father had not, the magistrate court held he was forever barred from establishing paternity, and dismissed his petition, with prejudice.
The magistrate court entered judgment in January 2022, which was amended in mid-February. Shortly thereafter, it granted a permissive appeal to this Court under Idaho Appellate Rule 12.1 and stayed the adoption proceedings pending our review. Father timely appealed.
This case turns on the nature of Father's parental rights under the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. We freely review constitutional questions. Nye v. Katsilometes , 165 Idaho 455, 458, 447 P.3d 903, 906 (2019).
Father attacks the decision of the magistrate court in three ways. First, he maintains that the adoption petition cannot preempt his paternity petition because it is defective for various reasons. Second, even if the petition is valid, he argues that several Idaho statutes, including Idaho Code sections 16-1504 and 16-1513, are unconstitutional on equal protection grounds. And third, he alleges several violations of his due process rights amount to reversible error. We address each of these arguments in turn.
In his first argument, Father contends that the adoption petition contained various defects on its face that cannot be corrected by amendment; therefore, it is a nullity and cannot preempt his petition for paternity. This argument is unpersuasive. Some of the defects alleged by Father are not defects at all, such as written consents to the adoption having not been filed simultaneously with the adoption petition. See I.C. § 16-1506 (). Others are obvious scrivener's errors that, in context of the petition as a whole, do not create confusion about any material issue and do not render the petition defective. See Gifford v. W. Ada Joint Sch. Dist. #2 , 169 Idaho 577, 583, 498 P.3d 1206, 1212 (2021) ().
The only potentially material error in the petition is its failure to list Grandfather's wife as a person whose consent to the adoption was required. See I.C. §§ 16-1503, 16-1506(1). However, this omission was corrected in the amended petition submitted by Mother. And although the magistrate court did not rule on Mother's motion to amend the petition, we are unpersuaded by Father's arguments that leave to amend cannot be granted. Therefore, the magistrate court did not err by failing to dismiss the adoption petition for any of the reasons just discussed.
Father asserts that seven statutes— Idaho Code sections 7-1106, 7-1111, 16-1501A, 16-1504, 16-1505, 16-1513, and 39-255 —are all unconstitutional on equal protection grounds because they allow unwed mothers to make certain decisions regarding their babies immediately upon birth, but unwed fathers do not automatically have similar rights.
"The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment commands that no State shall ‘deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws,’ which is essentially a direction that all persons similarly situated should be treated alike." City of Cleburne, Tex. v. Cleburne Living Ctr ., 473 U.S. 432, 439, 105 S.Ct. 3249, 87 L.Ed.2d 313 (1985) (citing Plyler v. Doe , 457 U.S. 202, 216, 102 S.Ct. 2382, 72 L.Ed.2d 786 (1982) ). However, the Equal Protection Clause does not require "things which are different in fact ... to be treated in law as though they were the same[.]" Michael M. v. Superior Ct. of Sonoma Cnty. , 450 U.S. 464, 469, 101 S.Ct. 1200, 67 L.Ed.2d 437 (1981) (quoting Rinaldi v. Yeager , 384 U.S. 305, 309, 86 S.Ct. 1497, 16 L.Ed.2d 577 (1966) ). According to Father, he and Mother are similarly situated because the...
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