Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. Solano Cnty. Dep't of Health v. J.T. (In re J.G.)

• Decision Date: 27 December 2018
• Docket Number: A153847
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: In re J.G. et al., Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. SOLANO COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND SOCIAL SERVICES, CHILD WELFARE SERVICES, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. J.T., Defendant and Appellant.

In re J.G. et al., Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.SOLANO COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND SOCIAL SERVICES,CHILD WELFARE SERVICES, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. J.T., Defendant and Appellant.

A153847

COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION FOUR

December 27, 2018

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

(Solano County Super. Ct. Nos. J40424, J40425, J40426, J42982, J42983)

This case concerns a family of five children: one boy, J.G. age 14; and four girls, T.C. age 10, A.G. age 9, J.G. age 7, and W.C. age 5. J.T. (Mother) has been the sole parent, as the fathers of the children have not been in the picture. Their parental rights, and Mother's, were terminated in January 2018. The permanent goal for the boy is legal guardianship, and the permanent plan for the four girls is adoption in two groups of two half-siblings each. Mother appeals, contending (1) there is insufficient evidence the four girls are adoptable; (2) the beneficial sibling relationship exception to termination of parental rights should have been applied; (3) the beneficial parental relationship exception should have been applied; and (4) the permanent plan for the girls should have been guardianship instead of adoption. We find no error and affirm the juvenile court's judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

The family came to the attention of the Solano County Department of Health and Social Services, Child Welfare Services (Department) when a concerned passerby reported seeing J.G. (girl), then three years old, moving her hand up and down on a man's erect penis as he reclined in the driver's seat of a car parked near Independence Park in Vallejo on April 18, 2015. The three older children were playing in the park unattended. The man was Raymond T., the husband of B.T., the children's maternal grandmother. Raymond T. was on parole after serving 25 years in prison for kidnapping a child and robbery. After realizing he had been seen, Raymond T. gathered the other children and was arrested as he tried to depart the scene in his car with all four children. He was charged with lewd and lascivious acts with a child under 14 and a parole violation. It later came to light that Raymond T. had also molested A.G. and T.C. Raymond T. was ultimately convicted of sexually abusing A.G. and T.C. and was sentenced to 60 years to life in prison.

The grandmother, when confronted, claimed she did not know Raymond T. "was like that." In fact, she said she did not know him very well, though they had been married for two or three years (since shortly after he was released on parole).

Mother had left the four oldest children with B.T. for more than two months and had signed a notarized letter giving her mother permission to have custody of them. Mother kept W.C., the youngest (then age 20 months), with her, though she was homeless and living in her car. J.G. (boy) shares a mother with the other children, but not a father. T.C. and W.C. are full siblings, as are A.G. and J.G. (girl).

At the time of the hearing under section 366.26, when Mother's parental rights were terminated (the termination hearing), Mother explained she thought her children would be safe with her mother, she did not know they would be left in Raymond T.'s care, and she did not know Raymond T.'s criminal history presented a risk for her children. She volunteered that she had always been safe growing up in her mother'shome, so she assumed her children would be safe, too. To the contrary, grandmother B.T. had told the social workers that Mother and her sister had been molested by their father in childhood without B.T.'s knowledge.

Mother initially resisted giving W.C. to the Department but complied after the court issued a warrant. The juvenile court detained all five children, and Mother was in no position to regain custody of them, as she did not have a home. She was unable to provide for them due to a combination of mental health issues, substance abuse, domestic violence with men in her life, unemployment, and chronic homelessness. She had exposed the children to severe domestic violence and regularly subjected them to "filthy" living conditions when she had anywhere for them to live at all.

There had been a previous dependency case for the three oldest children beginning in October 2010, following an incident of domestic violence involving a weapon, in which Mother was the victim. The dependency ended when the children were returned to Mother in July 2013. For the school year beginning in August 2014, the children attended only 12 days; Mother then withdrew them from school and took them to Oregon, where they did not attend school, returning with them to Solano County in late 2014 or early 2015. They were re-enrolled in school in February 2015. Mother then left the four oldest children with her mother for a planned six months, while she and the youngest child lived in her car and she concentrated on finding housing. Yet, when she was offered housing assistance by the Department, she initially turned it down, saying she would rather live in her car.

After a brief emergency detention, the four oldest children were placed in two sibling groups: J.G. (boy) and T.C. in one foster home and A.G. and J.G. (girl) in a different foster home, joined by W.C. after Mother surrendered her to the Department at the end of April 2015. On June 2, 2015, the juvenile court sustained the petition for all five children under Welfare and Institutions Code¹ section 300, subdivisions (b), (g) and(j), and for J.G. (girl), also under subdivision (d). Due to the Department's inability to locate a foster home that could take all five children, in late June 2015, the three oldest children were placed together in one foster home and the two youngest were placed in a different foster home.

The oldest child, J.G. (boy), was placed separately from his sisters in August 2017. He was placed with a single father and two other boys at the time Mother's parental rights were terminated. He did not want to end his relationship with Mother, so he preferred to be in a guardianship. (See § 366.26, subd. (c)(1)(B)(ii).) He opposed being adopted and resisted his sisters' adoption because he wanted to maintain sibling contacts. He did not want to go into a guardianship with his current foster father, though. At the time of the termination hearing, the Department was still looking for a permanent guardian for him. Mother's parental rights were not terminated to J.G. (boy). Mother's appeal raises no issues regarding the orders made for him.

The two oldest half-sisters, T.C. and A.G., have consistently been placed together in foster care since June 2015, but have moved from placement to placement. As of the termination hearing, they had spent 51 months in foster care during the two dependencies and had been in nine different foster placements during the current dependency alone. In the six months preceding the termination of parental rights, two different sets of foster parents had requested that T.C. and A.G. be removed from their care because they were overwhelmed by the sisters' behavior. Mother claims, because of their emotional dysregulation, these two children are not adoptable.

The two youngest fared better in foster care. They had spent 33 months in foster care in four different placements. At the time of the termination hearing, however, they had been in a stable placement for 19 months. Despite the Department's having identified a couple eager to adopt these two girls, Mother claims they are not adoptable.

Mother received at least 30 months of family reunification and family maintenance services in connection with the first dependency in 2010. After receiving 15 more months of reunification services during the current dependency, she failed toreunify with the children. Her services were terminated in July 2016,² and a section 366.26 hearing was set for November 2016.

In November 2016, the termination hearing was continued to December, and in December 2016, it was continued to May 2017 to allow the Department additional time to formulate a permanent plan for the children. In May 2017, a hearing was held, adoption was selected as the girls' permanent goal, without termination of parental rights, guardianship was selected as the permanent goal for J.G. (boy), and the matter was again continued to November 2017 at the Department's request. After one more continuance, the termination hearing was held on January 25, 2018.

Mother and the father of A.G. and J.G. (girl) objected to the plan of adoption proposed by the Department for the four girls. One of the father's primary concerns was that his two daughters would be separated by adoption into two different families. He claimed his daughters were not adoptable and the sibling exception should apply. Mother claimed none of the children was adoptable, and she asserted both the sibling exception and the beneficial parental relationship exception to termination of her parental rights. (§ 366.26, subd. (c)(1)(B)(i), (c)(1)(B)(v).)

The court selected guardianship as the permanent goal for J.G. (boy) and adoption as the permanent plan for the four girls. The court considered the parents' argument thatthe girls were not adoptable "disingenuous" and said the parents should not "benefit" from a finding that the children were not adoptable, given that the children's behaviors were a "product of the behaviors of the parents."³ The judge found the children likely to be adopted "based upon what [the judge] believe[d] to be a fair assessment of the children, that they are bright, loving, playful, warm children who will adapt to and thrive in a stable environment." He denied...