In re Adoption of TLC

• Decision Date: 21 May 2002
• Citation: 46 P.3d 863,2002 WY 76
• Parties: In the Matter of the ADOPTION OF TLC. TOC, Appellant (Respondent), v. TND and DLD, Appellees (Petitioners).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

46 P.3d 863

2002 WY 76

In the Matter of the ADOPTION OF TLC.

TOC, Appellant (Respondent), v. TND and DLD, Appellees (Petitioners).

No. C-00-5.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

May 21, 2002.

DaNece Day Koenigs and Daniel B. Bailey of Lubnau, Hand & Bailey LLC, Gillette, Wyoming, Representing Appellant. Argument by Ms. Koenigs.

Michael N. Patchen, Gillette, Wyoming, Representing Appellees. Argument by Mr. Patchen.

Before LEHMAN, C.J.; GOLDEN and KITE, JJ.; and SPANGLER, D.J., Ret.

LEHMAN, Chief Justice.

[¶ 1] Appellant TOC (Father) appeals from the district court's order granting the adoption of his seven-year-old daughter, TLC to TND (Stepfather) without Father's consent. We hold that the record does not demonstrate clear and convincing evidence to support either of the statutory factors relied upon by the district court to grant this adoption without the consent of Father. Accordingly, we reverse.

ISSUES

[¶ 2] Father presents the following issues for our analysis:

A. Did the District Court err in failing to strictly construe the provisions of W.S. § 1-22-101 et seq. and grant every reasonable intendment in favor of the father contesting the adoption of his child?

B. Was the District Court's finding that the father had willfully failed to pay child support pursuant to W.S. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) and (ix) an abuse of discretion when the failure to pay child support was a result of the father's incarceration?

C. Was the District Court's finding that the father had abandoned the child pursuant to W.S. § 1-22-110(a)(iii) an abuse of discretion when there was no intent to abandon the child?

D. Without specific statutory authority, can the District Court find a parent's incarceration sufficient grounds for entering an adoption pursuant to W.S. § 1-22-110?

FACTS

[¶ 3] The record before this court contains no transcript of the hearing in this case. Additionally, Father has improperly invoked W.R.A.P. 3.03 by failing to follow its requirements.¹ However, for the limited purpose of generating this contextual section of our opinion, we will utilize portions of the parties' agreed upon statement of proceedings as otherwise supported by the record.

[¶ 4] On June 4, 1992, TLC was born to Father and DLD (Mother). Since her birth, the child has continuously lived with Mother. Mother and child resided with Father for various periods from the time of the child's birth until the spring of 1997. During one of these periods, Mother and Father purchased a home together. Mother and child have lived with petitioner Stepfather since May of 1997.

[¶ 5] In December of 1995, Father was sentenced to serve a term of three to six years in the Wyoming State Penitentiary for delivering a controlled substance. He was released on probation and ordered to serve a forty-five day split sentence on weekends. In April of 1996, his probation was revoked, and he was placed in the state penitentiary. He was transferred to the Campbell County Community Corrections Facility in August of 1996 where he stayed until March of 1997. In July of 1998, Father's parole was revoked and he was again placed in the state penitentiary until August of 1999 when he was again released to the corrections facility where he resided at the time of trial.

[¶ 6] Father's paternity and parental obligations were judicially established by a court order that was entered on September 15, 1995. The paternity decree required Father to pay $192 per month in child support. In December 1999, Father owed $9,636.50 in child support arrearages. During periods of incarceration, Father was under thirty-five to sixty-five percent wage withholding for his child support obligations and while imprisoned failed to seek modification of his child support obligation.

[¶ 7] In addition to the periods Mother and Father lived together, Father saw the child approximately twenty times from her birth until the spring of 1997. Since 1997, Father has purchased three gifts for the child including a bicycle and a clock. While in the penitentiary Father mailed his daughter three letters and made monthly collect calls to her lasting from two to five minutes.

[¶ 8] Stepfather and Mother filed a Petition for Adoption October 14, 1999, alleging that Father had abandoned the child and had willfully failed to provide court-ordered child support. Father objected to the petition. A hearing was conducted, and the district court entered its Final Decree of Adoption over Father's objection on January 21, 2000. This timely appeal followed.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

[¶ 9] This court reviews orders of adoption under an abuse of discretion standard. We succinctly stated this standard in Matter of Adoption of SMR, 982 P.2d 1246, 1248 (Wyo.1999):

The power to grant or deny a petition for adoption is within the discretion of the trial court. Matter of Adoption of BGH, 930 P.2d 371, 377 (Wyo.1996); Matter of Adoption of GSD, 716 P.2d 984, 988 (Wyo.1986). "Judicial discretion is a composite of many things, among which are conclusions drawn from objective criteria." Mintle v. Mintle, 764 P.2d 255, 257 (Wyo.1988) (quoting Martin v. State, 720 P.2d 894, 897 (Wyo.1986)). "In determining whether there has been an abuse of discretion, the ultimate issue is whether the court could reasonably have concluded as it did." Matter of Adoption of BGH, 930 P.2d at 377-78 (quoting Matter of Adoption of CCT, 640 P.2d 73, 76 (Wyo.1982)). In the context of alleged abuse of discretion, the assessment of the circumstances in the case

is tantamount to an evaluation of whether the evidence is sufficient to support the decision of the district court. In review of the evidence, we accept the successful party's submissions, granting them every favorable inference fairly to be drawn and leaving out of consideration conflicting evidence presented by the unsuccessful party.

(Quoting Basolo v. Basolo, 907 P.2d 348, 353 (Wyo.1995).)

DISCUSSION

[¶ 10] It is within the following constitutional framework that we are constrained to review Father's case. First and foremost, we recognize that the right to familial association is a fundamental right protected by both the Wyoming and the United States Constitutions. DS v. Dep't of Public Assistance & Social Servs., 607 P.2d 911, 918 (Wyo.1980); Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645, 651, 92 S.Ct. 1208, 1213, 31 L.Ed.2d 551 (1972) (integrity of the family unit protected by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Ninth Amendment). Accordingly, adoption statutes are strictly construed when the proceeding is against a nonconsenting parent, and every reasonable intendment is made in favor of that parent's claims. In re Adoption of Female Child X, 537 P.2d 719, 723 (Wyo.1975); In re Adoption of Narragon, 530 P.2d 413, 414 (Wyo.1975). This court has explored the substantial policies supporting that tenet in Matter of Adoption of Voss, 550 P.2d 481, 485 (Wyo.1976):

[T]he earliest and most hallowed of the ties that bind humanity, in all countries considered sacred, is the relationship of parent and child. Therefore, parents have the first and natural right to their children. A decree of adoption tears asunder forever the parent-child relationship and for all legal and practical purposes, that child is the same as dead to the parent affected. The parent has lost the right to ever again see the child or even know of his whereabouts. Courts cautiously guard the parent-child relationship.

[¶ 11] Adoptions can occur without the consent of a parent only under certain statutorily delineated circumstances. Because of the fundamental liberty interest at stake, the applicable statutes must be strictly construed. Moreover, the party requesting adoption bears the burden of proving the existence of at least one of the statutory factors by clear and convincing evidence. In re Adoption of Strauser, 65 Wyo. 98, 196 P.2d 862, 867 (Wyo.1948) ("When a parent refuses to consent, and the matter in controversy is whether he had abandoned the child so as to dispense with the necessity of his consent, the burden of proof is on the party seeking to justify the adoption on that ground, and the courts often say that the evidence to show abandonment must be clear and convincing."); In re Adoption of Female Child X, 537 P.2d at 722 ("Petitioners, seeking to establish an exception and facts which would justify the absence of parental consent, have the burden of this proof.")

[¶ 12] Subsequent to this court's decisions regarding the standard and burden of proof, the U.S. Supreme Court has also recognized the clear and convincing standard as the constitutionally mandated minimum standard for the termination of parental rights. In Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U.S. 745, 753-54, 102 S.Ct. 1388, 1394-95, 71 L.Ed.2d 599 (1982)² the Court determined that:

The fundamental liberty interest of natural parents in the care, custody, and management of their child does not evaporate simply because they have not been model parents or have lost temporary custody of their child to the State. Even when blood relationships are strained, parents retain a vital interest in preventing the irretrievable destruction of their family life. If anything, persons faced with forced dissolution of their parental rights have a more critical need for procedural protections than do those resisting state intervention into ongoing family affairs. When the State moves to destroy weakened familial bonds, it must provide the parents with fundamentally fair procedures.

[¶ 13] The Court next reasoned that, "[t]he function of a standard of proof, as that concept is embodied in the Due Process Clause and in the realm of factfinding, is to `instruct the factfinder concerning the degree of confidence our society thinks he should have in the correctness of factual conclusions for a particular type of adjudication.'" 455 U.S. at 754-55, 102 S.Ct. at 1395 (quoting Addington v. Texas, 441 U.S. 418, 423, 99 S.Ct. 1804, 1808, 60...