In re Alba P.-V.

• Decision Date: 07 May 2012
• Docket Number: AC 33784
• Court: Connecticut Court of Appeals
• Parties: IN RE ALBA P.-V . ET AL.*

IN RE ALBA P.-V . ET AL.^*

AC 33784

COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT

Argued March 7, 2012

officially released May 7, 2012^**

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(Appeal from Superior Court, judicial district of New

Haven, Juvenile Matters, Brown, J.)

Christina D. Ghio, for the appellant (respondent mother).

Michael J. LaMonica, assistant attorney general, with whom, on the brief, was George Jepsen, attorney general, and Benjamin Zivyon, assistant attorney general, for the appellee (petitioner).

Brendon P. Levesque, with whom, on the brief, was Dana M. Hrelic and Michael S. Taylor, for the minor children.

Opinion

BEAR, J. The respondent mother appeals from the judgments of the trial court adjudicating two of her children neglected and ordering a six month period of protective supervision.¹ On appeal, the respondent²claims that: (1) the court erred when it concluded that there was a substantiation of sexual abuse of her daughter, (2) the court improperly found the children neglected based only on a prior substantiation of abuse and on her daughter's recent pregnancy, (3) the court's construction of General Statutes § 46b-120 (8) infringed on her constitutional right to family integrity and (4) as applied, § 46b-120 (8) is unconstitutionally vague. We do not address the respondent's claims because we dismiss the appeal as moot.

The following facts and procedural history are relevant to our disposition of this appeal. The respondent's minor children, Alba and Guadalupe, were adjudicated neglected in 2008 upon the respondent's nolo contendere plea. Pursuant to the 2008 adjudications, a period of protective supervision was ordered. The respondent did not appeal from the adjudications of neglect or the dispositional orders. In September 2009, the period of protective supervision expired.

On September 1, 2010, the department of children and families (department) opened an investigation after a school administrator reported that Alba, who at the time of the report was thirteen years old, was pregnant. On November 8, 2010, the petitioner, the commissioner of children and families, filed a petition for an adjudication of neglect with respect to both children, alleging that they had been denied proper care and attention, were living under conditions injurious to their wellbeing, had been abused and suffered from conditions resulting from that abuse. In support of her petition, the commissioner alleged, inter alia, that there was a substantiated case of sexual abuse of Alba and Guadalupe in 2008 by their father and that he did not provide for them financially. With regard to the respondent, the commissioner alleged that there was a substantiated case of physical neglect of the children stemming from the 2008 incident of sexual abuse by their father, one unsubstantiated case of physical neglect of Alba from 2010, and a 2010 substantiated case of physical neglect of both children due to Alba's pregnancy.

On June 8, 2011, the court adjudicated Alba and Guadalupe as neglected based on its finding, pursuant to § 46b-120 (8), that they were denied proper care and attention. The court also entered an order of protective supervision for a period of six months. This appeal followed.

On December 28,2011, while this appeal was pending, the period of protective supervision expired. Thereafter, the petitioner filed a motion to dismiss the appealon the ground that the appeal was moot. On January 11, 2012, this court denied the motion ''without prejudice to the [petitioner] briefing the mootness claim in [a] brief in addition to the merits of the appeal.''

Mootness is an exception to the general rule that jurisdiction, once acquired, is not lost by the occurrence of subsequent events. See In re Shonna K., 77 Conn. App. 246, 258, 822 A.2d 1009 (2003). Because mootness goes to the power of this court to entertain an appeal, we address the issue as a threshold matter. See Kennedy v. Kennedy, 109 Conn. App. 591, 598-99, 952 A.2d 115 (2008).

The respondent concedes that the period of protective supervision of the children by the department has expired, and, as a result, no practical relief could flow from reversal of the court's dispositional imposition of protective supervision. Nonetheless, she argues that review is proper under either of two exceptions to the mootness doctrine: collateral consequences and the capable of repetition yet evading review doctrine. The petitioner argues that the expiration of the period of protective supervision renders this appeal moot and that the exceptions do not apply. We agree with the petitioner.

We first address the respondent's claim that her appeal is saved by the collateral consequences exception. ''[D]espite developments during the pendency of an appeal that would otherwise render a claim moot, the court may retain jurisdiction when a litigant shows that there is a reasonable possibility that prejudicial collateral consequences will occur.'' (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Williams v. Ragaglia, 261 Conn. 219, 226, 802 A.2d 778 (2002).

The respondent argues that her family's history with the department makes it reasonably foreseeable that it will come under the department's scrutiny in the future. She argues that if any future involvement does occur, the department or the court ''will undoubtedly consider any prior substantiations and adjudications.''

Our Supreme Court has considered the relevance of past interaction with the department when determining the reasonable possibility of future interaction with the department resulting in collateral consequences to a litigant. Williams v. Ragaglia, supra, 261 Conn. 228-29 (foster caregiver's likelihood of future involvement with department based on previously accepting care of foster children).³ Even if we assume that the respondent's history with the department creates a reasonable possibility that she or her family will have future interactions with the department, the respondent has not demonstrated that there is a reasonable possibility that the adjudications of neglect that are the subject of this appeal will result in prejudicial collateral consequences to her.⁴

The respondent argues that the present adjudications may form the basis of a subsequent coterminous petition⁵ to terminate her parental rights. While acknowledging that the 2008 neglect adjudications could form the basis of a termination petition, the respondent argues that this ''does not lessen the potential that [the department] and the [c]ourt would rely on this more recent adjudication.'' The respondent contends that the present neglect adjudications, if left unchallenged, would burden her with multiple adjudications and ''likely have significant impact in subsequent proceedings beyond the impact of the 2008 order of temporary custody and adjudication alone.'' We are not persuaded.

General Statutes § 17a-112 (j) (3) (B) (i) provides that a court may terminate the parental rights to a child that ''has been found by the Superior Court or the Probate Court to have been neglected or uncared for in a prior proceeding . . . .''⁶ Thus, the statute requires only a single prior adjudication of neglect as to the child who is the subject of a termination of parental rights petition.

The respondent concedes that the 2008 adjudications can serve as the basis for a termination proceeding alleging her failure to achieve sufficient personal rehabilitation under § 17a-112 (j) (3) (B) (i). Accordingly, review of the present adjudications would provide the respondent with no practical relief from this claimed collateral consequence; Alba and Guadalupe still would be exposed to a subsequent termination of parental rights proceeding predicated on the 2008 adjudications. Whether the court would rely on the more recent adjudications or whether the present adjudications would have significant impact on a subsequent proceeding requires us to speculate as to what weight, if any, a court would assign to the present adjudications. Here, unlike Williams, the respondent did not have a ''clean'' record with the department prior to the adjudications of neglect that are the subject of this appeal. See Williams v. Ragaglia, supra, 261 Conn. 225. Thus, even if we were to review and to reverse the present adjudications, neither the status of the respondent nor her children with the department would change. The children will have been adjudicated neglected by virtue of the 2008 adjudications, and the respondent will remain the parent of children previously found to have been neglected. Thus, because of the 2008 neglect adjudications, which were not appealed, our...