San Joaquin Cnty. Human Servs. Agency v. V.V. (In re H.G.)

• Docket Number: C099161
• Decision Date: 22 April 2024
• Parties: In re H.G. et al., Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. v. V.V., Defendant and Appellant. SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY, Plaintiff and Respondent,
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

1

In re H.G. et al., Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.

SAN JOAQUIN COUNTY HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY, Plaintiff and Respondent,
v.
V.V., Defendant and Appellant.

C099161

California Court of Appeals, Third District, San Joaquin

April 22, 2024

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

Super. Ct. No. STKJVDP20180000407

Mesiwala, J.

This is the second appeal filed by appellant V.V. (mother), mother of the three minors, after termination of her parental rights. (Welf. &Inst. Code, § 366.26; undesignated statutory references are to the Welfare and Institutions Code.) In mother's previous appeal, this court conditionally affirmed and remanded for limited proceedings to ensure compliance with the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 (ICWA) (25 U.S.C. § 1901 et seq.).

2

In this appeal from the juvenile court's orders reinstating the orders terminating parental rights and freeing the minors for adoption, mother again contends the juvenile court and the San Joaquin County Human Services Agency (Agency) failed to comply with the requirements of the ICWA. We disagree and affirm.

BACKGROUND

The three minors became the subject of a dependency action in conjunction with a petition filed by the Agency pursuant to section 300, subdivisions (b) and (g). (In re H.G. (Dec. 13, 2022, C095621) [nonpub. opn.].) Upon initial inquiry, mother stated she had no known Indian ancestry. Father D.G. (father) confirmed he had no known Indian ancestry.

Mother later informed the Agency she believed that her great-uncle was affiliated with the Choctaw Tribe of Shreveport, Louisiana. She reportedly "provided limited names" that were included in the ICWA-030 form (ICWA notice), including the names of, and identifying information about both parents, the maternal and paternal grandparents, and the maternal great-grandfathers. The notice also included the names of two maternal great-uncles and a maternal great-aunt. The ICWA notices were mailed on December 6, 2018, to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians, and the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians Choctaw Branch. All three of the Choctaw tribes responded that the minors were not eligible for enrollment based on the information provided by the Agency. The Agency requested that the court make a finding that the ICWA did not apply.

Following a contested jurisdiction/disposition hearing, the court exercised jurisdiction over the minors and adopted the Agency's recommended findings and orders, including a finding that the minors were not Indian children within the meaning of the ICWA. The court eventually terminated parental rights and freed the minors for adoption without making any additional ICWA findings.

3

Mother appealed. (In re H.G., supra, C095621.) She argued the Agency failed to make any ICWA inquiry of the minors' maternal relatives or determine if there were any paternal relatives available for inquiry. She further argued the juvenile court failed its obligation to determine whether the Agency met the inquiry and notice requirements of the ICWA or to make an ICWA finding at all. As the record reflected, mother had a number of living maternal relatives, and there was no indication in the record that the Agency made any effort to inquire of those relatives to obtain the necessary ICWA notice information. This court agreed with mother and conditionally affirmed and remanded for the limited purpose of ensuring proper compliance with the inquiry and notice requirements of the ICWA. Remittitur issued on February 21, 2023.

On remand, the Agency was ordered to make further ICWA inquiry. Earlier, in December 2022, the social worker sent an email to mother referencing mother's previous report that the minors' maternal great-uncle was affiliated with the Choctaw Tribe and requesting that mother provide the names, dates of birth, addresses, telephone numbers, and birth and death certificates of the maternal great-uncle and all maternal family members who were or might be associated with an Indian tribe or tribes.

In February 2023, the social worker mailed letters to "all of the family, friends, and associates, related to the biological mother . . . to inquire if the maternal side of the family has Indian Ancestry." The Agency reported it did not receive any responses from its emails to the maternal family members.^[1]

In March and April 2023, the Agency filed signed parental notification of Indian status forms (ICWA-020) from father, father's ex-wife R.G., and an apparently unrelated individual named B.P., all of whom stated they had no Indian ancestry.

4

In a series of emails sent in late April and early May 2023, mother informed the Agency that she was "Creek Freedmen with some Choctaw" and provided the names of the maternal grandmother B.M.V., the maternal great-grandparents R.M. and J.H., and the maternal great-great-grandmother S.H., who was "on the Dawes Rolls." She subsequently provided documentation related to her Indian ancestry, including her birth certificate, the Creek Freedmen and Creeks by Blood Dawes rolls, the social security application and claims index for great-grandmother J.H., and the federal censuses for great-grandmother and several other maternal relatives. On May 18, 2023, the Agency sent an amended ICWA notice, including the documents provided by mother, to the tribes identified by mother.

On July 7, 2023, the Agency filed an ICWA-020 form signed by mother indicating mother had possible Indian heritage with the "Muscogee Creek, Creek Freedman and Choctaw (the five civilized tribes in Dawes Act)" in Louisiana, listing mother's ancestors as grandmother J.H., great-grandmother S.H., and great-great-grandfather J.O.H., and identifying the tribe in which either mother or the minor possessed an identification card indicating membership or citizenship in a tribe as "Dawes Act Rolls circa 1897 and 1907 586 5366, 5071464, 10359."

Later that same month, the Agency filed a declaration of ICWA efforts stating that, in May 2023, it mailed ICWA notices to seven Choctaw tribes and the BIA and had not received responses from two of the tribes or the BIA. Given the passage of 60...