In re A.K.
| Decision Date | 10 February 2022 |
| Docket Number | 2020-1163 |
| Citation | 168 Ohio St.3d 225,198 N.E.3d 47 |
| Parties | IN RE ADOPTION OF A.K. et al. |
| Court | Ohio Supreme Court |
Law Offices of James B. Palmquist III and Rebecca Clark, Medina; and Michelle K. McGuire, Cleveland, for appellants.
Mary Catherine Barrett Co., L.P.A., and Mary Catherine Barrett, Rocky River, for appellee.
Stewart, J., announcing the judgment of the court.
{¶ 1} This case is a discretionary appeal involving R.C. 3107.07, the statute that provides exceptions to requiring parental consent for the adoption of minors. We are asked to decide whether under this court's holding in In re Adoption of B.I. , 157 Ohio St.3d 29, 2019-Ohio-2450, 131 N.E.3d 28, a parent's consent to the adoption of his children is required when that parent has not had more than de minimis contact with his children for at least one year prior to the filing of an adoption petition and the parent was under a court order to have no contact with his children. This opinion concludes that it is required and that a parent's right to consent to the adoption of his or her child is not extinguished under R.C. 3107.07(A) for lack of sufficient contact with the child when the parent has acted in compliance with a no-contact order prohibiting communication or contact with his or her minor child. We affirm the judgment of the Eighth District Court of Appeals.
Facts and Procedural History
{¶ 2} In April 2007, appellee, the natural father of A.K. and C.K., was convicted of murdering the minors’ mother and was sentenced to a prison term of 23 years to life. A.K. and C.K. were placed with appellants, their maternal grandparents, after the murder and have been in their legal custody since February 2007. When the Juvenile Division of the Summit County Court of Common Pleas awarded custody of the children to the grandparents, the order specifically stated: "Father shall have no contact with the minor children absent an Order from this Court."
{¶ 3} In 2015, the grandparents filed petitions to adopt the children in the Probate Division of the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas. The father filed objections, and the adoption proceedings were bifurcated to first address whether the need to obtain the father's consent was extinguished under R.C. 3107.07(A). If the court determined that consent was not necessary, it would then decide whether adoption was in the best interest of the children in a subsequent hearing.
{¶ 4} R.C. 3107.07(A) provides that the consent of a natural parent to the adoption of his or her child is not required under certain circumstances. Relevant to this case, consent is not required if the court finds by clear and convincing evidence that the parent has failed, with no justifiable cause, to have more than de minimis contact with the child for at least one year immediately preceding the filing of the adoption petition or the minor's placement in the home of the petitioner. R.C. 3107.07(A). The magistrate who presided over the consent hearing determined that the grandparents did not establish by clear and convincing evidence that the father's failure to communicate with the children during the one-year period prior to the petitions for adoption being filed was not justified, finding that the no-contact order from the juvenile court facially established evidence of a justifiable excuse.
{¶ 5} The grandparents filed objections to the decision, which the probate court sustained. The court determined that the father's consent was not required, because it was his conduct that led to the no-contact order and therefore the order could not provide justifiable cause for his lack of contact with the children for the year prior to the filing of the petitions.
{¶ 6} The father appealed to the Eighth District Court of Appeals, and in a split decision, the court affirmed the probate court's decision. In re A.K. , 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 105426, 2017-Ohio-9165, 2017 WL 6540636 (" A.K. I "). In A.K. I , the court of appeals agreed with the probate court's conclusion that it would be unjust to allow the father to use his imprisonment to justify his failure to contact his children when it was his actions that necessitated his prison sentence. The Eighth District remanded the case to the probate court to determine whether adoption was in the best interest of the children. The magistrate found that the adoption of A.K. and C.K. was in their best interest and granted the grandparents’ petitions. The father filed objections to the magistrate's decision, but the court adopted the decision granting the petitions for adoption.
{¶ 7} The father appealed the probate court's judgment, asserting that (1) the probate court erred in holding that the grandparents met their burden of establishing that they could adopt the children without the father's consent and (2) the probate court erred in holding that the grandparents met their burden of establishing that adoption was in the children's best interest. The Eighth District reversed the judgment of the trial court based on this court's intervening decision in B.I. , 157 Ohio St.3d 29, 2019-Ohio-2450, 131 N.E.3d 28. In re Adoption of A.K. , 2020-Ohio-3279, 155 N.E.3d 239 (" A.K. II ").
{¶ 8} The Eighth District noted that the issue whether the father's consent to the adoptions was necessary had been decided in A.K. I and that pursuant to the law-of-the-case doctrine, the issue would generally not be revisited. A.K. II at ¶ 13. However, the court of appeals held that our decision in B.I. was intervening and controlling authority regarding the parental-consent analysis under R.C. 3107.07(A) and that it was therefore required to reexamine the issue. A.K. II at ¶ 13, citing Hopkins v. Dyer , 104 Ohio St.3d 461, 2004-Ohio-6769, 820 N.E.2d 329 (). In a split decision, the Eighth District held that under B.I. , the father's reliance on the no-contact order constituted justifiable cause for his having had no contact with his children.
{¶ 9} The grandparents filed an application for reconsideration and a motion to certify a conflict. The Eighth District denied both. The grandparents subsequently filed this discretionary appeal, which we accepted on a single proposition of law:
Whether the holding in In re [Adoption of ] B.I. applies broadly such that the mere existence of any judicial order precluding a natural parent from communication with his minor children is sufficient justifiable cause to [not] provide more than * * * de minimis contact with the minor for a period of at least one year under R.C. 3107.07(A).
See 160 Ohio St.3d 1495, 2020-Ohio-5634, 159 N.E.3d 273.
Law and Analysis
{¶ 10} As an initial matter, the grandparents argue, and the dissenting opinions agree, that the Eighth District Court of Appeals should not have revisited the issue of consent. They assert that because the issue of justifiable cause was decided in A.K. I , 2017-Ohio-9165, the court of appeals was barred from further consideration of that issue based on the law-of-the-case doctrine. This is an incorrect understanding of the doctrine. Although it is true that a reviewing court's prior ruling on a legal question in a case will generally not be disturbed in subsequent proceedings in the same case, Nolan v. Nolan , 11 Ohio St.3d 1, 3, 462 N.E.2d 410 (1984), the law-of-the-case doctrine is not an automatic or an absolute bar to subsequent review of such a legal issue. The doctrine must give way in certain circumstances, one of which is when an intervening decision rendered by a superior court is at odds with a legal determination made in the pending matter. Jones v. Harmon , 122 Ohio St. 420, 424, 172 N.E. 151 (1930). As the opinion concurring in judgment only notes, the doctrine does not serve to limit the authority of a court and its application is discretionary. Opinion concurring in judgment only, ¶ 34. We therefore reject the position that the Eighth District was precluded from revisiting the issue of consent in this case; the court revisited the issue to determine whether our decision in B.I . was intervening authority that required a change to the appellate court's prior judgment.
{¶ 12} "The cornerstone of the adoption statutes is the promotion of children's welfare, specifically those children who lack and are in need of the security and benefits of a loving home and family." In re Adoption of Kohorst , 75 Ohio App.3d 813, 817, 600 N.E.2d 843 (3d Dist.1992). R.C. 3107.07(A) operates only to...
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