Stivers v. Knox County Dept. of Public Welfare, 1-185A8
| Decision Date | 10 September 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. 1-185A8,1-185A8 |
| Citation | 482 N.E.2d 748 |
| Parties | Patricia STIVERS, Appellant (Respondent below), v. KNOX COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WELFARE, Appellee (Petitioner below), and Robert Lee Stivers, Appellee (Respondent below). |
| Court | Indiana Appellate Court |
Joe D. Black, Ramsey & Black, Vincennes, for appellant.
Robert D. Lewis, Miller, Lewis & Miller, Vincennes, for appellee.
The appellant-respondent Patricia Stivers appeals from a trial court judgment finding that Stivers' daughter is a child in need of services and making the daughter a ward of the appellee-petitioner Knox County Department of Public Welfare (DPW).
We reverse for the reasons stated below.
The facts show that IND.CODE 31-6-11-14 creates a community child protection team. The statute reads:
The director of the county department of public welfare shall appoint and convene a community-wide, multi-disciplinary child protection team to be known as the "community child protection team." The team shall include the director of the local child protection service or his representative and the juvenile court judge or his representative and may include a representative of the local law enforcement agency, a representative of a local school system, a physician, a nurse, attorney, social worker, person trained in mental health, a representative of a community mental health facility, a person trained in mental retardation or representative of a community-based mental retardation or other developmental disability center, or a representative of a local child abuse and neglect group, and one (1) or more lay representatives of the community. The team shall consist of no less than five (5) and no more than eleven (11) members who shall elect a team coordinator from their own membership. (Emphasis added).
The duties and functions of the community child protection team are set forth in IND.CODE 31-6-11-15:
(a) The team coordinator shall supply the community child protection team with copies of reports of child abuse or neglect under section 11 [31-6-11-11] of this chapter.
(b) The coordinator shall also supply the team with any other information or reports he considers essential to its deliberations.
(c) The child protection team may meet at least once a month or at such times as its services are needed by the child protection service. Meetings shall be called by the team coordinator, who shall determine the agenda; however, a majority of the membership of the team may call a meeting upon giving forty-eight-hour notice to all the members. Notwithstanding IC 5-14-1.5 [5-14-1.5-1--5-14-1.5-7], meetings are open only to those persons authorized to receive information under this chapter.
(d) The child protection team shall provide diagnostic and prognostic service for the local child protection service or the juvenile court, and may recommend to the local child protection service that a petition be filed in the juvenile court on behalf of the subject child if it believes this would best serve the interests of the child.
The DPW availed itself of this procedure with the juvenile court judge participating in the community child protection team. In September and November, 1983, and May, 1984, the Stivers case was a subject of discussion at the team meeting. The juvenile court judge was in attendance at each of these meetings. A summary of the discussions as it related to the Stivers case reveals that facts which would serve as a basis for a child in need of services petition were discussed and that recommendations for instituting legal proceedings, including a petition for terminating parental rights, were considered and, ultimately, sought at the instigation of the DPW and the child protection team.
Stivers filed a motion for change of venue from the judge founded upon the judge's participation and/or presence in the meetings of the team at which her particular case was discussed. The motion was denied causing reversible error.
At the outset we note that cooperation between authorities and agencies dealing with problems stemming from troubled parental-child relationships is laudable. However, it cannot serve as a reason to depart from the paramount principle of a fair and impartial judiciary.
The Code of Judicial Conduct, in parts directly relevant to this appeal provides:
CANON 1
A Judge Should Uphold the Integrity and
An independent and honorable judiciary is indispensable to justice in our society. A judge should participate in establishing, maintaining, and enforcing, and should himself observe, high standards of conduct so that the integrity and independence of the judiciary may be preserved. The provisions of this Code should be construed and applied to further that objective without any limitation upon the Supreme Court in the exercise of its power of general superintendence, whether statutory or inherent, in areas not delineated in the Code.
A Judge Should Avoid Impropriety and the
A. A judge should respect and comply with the law and should conduct himself at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary.
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CANNON 3
A Judge Should Perform the Duties of His Office
The judicial duties of a judge take precedence over all his other activities. His judicial duties include all the duties of his office prescribed by law. In the performance of these duties, the following standards apply:
A. Adjudicative Responsibilities.
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(4) A judge should accord to every person who is legally interested in a proceeding, or his lawyer, full right to be heard according to law, and, except as authorized by law, neither...
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Leisure v. Leisure
...such information biased the judge, we presume that the judge remained unbiased. Husband relies upon Stivers v. Knox County Department of Public Welfare (1985), Ind.App., 482 N.E.2d 748. In that case, the trial judge was exposed to information regarding the cause in question prior to it bein......
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Andrews v. State, 1-1185A295
...has held that a judge's personal knowledge acquired through extrajudicial sources requires recusal. Stivers v. Knox County Dept. of Public Welfare (1985), Ind.App., 482 N.E.2d 748, 751; Jones v. State (1981), Ind.App., 416 N.E.2d 880, However, the law also presumes that a judge is unbiased ......
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Smith v. State
...Judicial Conduct prohibit conduct which compromises the availability of a fair and impartial judiciary. Stivers v. Knox County Dept. of Welfare (1985), Ind.App., 482 N.E.2d 748, 749. However, Smith has not shown any act or conduct in the record which demonstrates bias, prejudice or manifest......
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Green v. State
...on the ground that the trial judge should have disqualified himself." Id. at 881. Green also cites Stivers v. Knox County Dept. of Public Welfare, 482 N.E.2d 748 (Ind.Ct.App.1985) to support his argument that any extrajudicial knowledge requires recusal of the trial judge. Stivers should be......