Opinion
No. 12–P–1164.
2013-01-28
ADOPTION OF KATIE.
By the Court (GRASSO, KAFKER & MEADE, JJ.).
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 1:28
We affirm the decree of the Juvenile Court judge terminating the father's parental rights to his daughter. After careful review of the record, we are satisfied that the judge's factual findings, which are amply supported by the record, provide clear and convincing evidence that the father is unfit to care for the child and that termination is in her best interests. See Adoption of Abby, 62 Mass.App.Ct. 816, 823–824 (2005); G.L.c. 210, § 3. The father's unavailability to the child throughout her life, and his unwillingness to parent her, to engage in services with the Department of Children and Families (DCF), and to participate meaningfully in these proceedings demonstrate his unfitness and the need to free the child for adoption.
For purposes of this appeal, we assume that the father has now been adjudicated the biological father of the child. See note 3, infra. The mother did not appeal from the termination of her parental rights.
The father has never had a meaningful relationship with the child or served as a parental presence in her life. Upon learning of the mother's pregnancy in 2002, the father moved from Massachusetts and left the mother and the unborn child to fend for themselves. After the child's birth in 2003, he never sought to be legally adjudicated her father and never assumed a parental role in her life or asserted his parental rights. To the contrary, during a visit with the mother in 2009, the father did nothing to remedy or call to the attention of authorities conditions of neglect and exposure to drugs and domestic violence in which the child was living in the mother's household. See Custody of Vaughn, 422 Mass. 590, 599 (1996). After the child was placed in DCF custody in April of 2010 and through the time of trial, the father neither visited, nor requested telephone or other contact, with the child. Even after commencement of these proceedings, the father indicated that he was not interested in parenting or having contact with the child unless and until he was proved to be her biological parent. He then did little to expedite that determination, and it remained unresolved at the time of trial in 2012. Other than engaging in a telephone assessment, the father failed to complete reasonable DCF service plan requirements including establishing his paternity, completing home visits, providing Criminal Offender Record Information from Alabama (where the father lives), and participating in the underlying court proceedings and foster care reviews. Indeed, the father did not appear for trial, or even participate telephonically or otherwise.
In response to a question from the panel at oral argument, the father's counsel reported that subsequent to the trial the father was adjudicated the child's biological parent.
The judge properly considered the factors present in G.L.c. 210, § 3( c ), in concluding that the father's past disinterest and deficiencies were probative of his current and future parental fitness. The judge was clearly correct in concluding that the father's unavailability to the child and disinterest in parenting her were so substantial and longstanding that there was no likelihood of his meeting the child's important needs or providing for her welfare in the immediate future. See Adoption of Nancy, 443 Mass. 512, 516 (2005). The child requires and deserves a permanency in her life that the father has never given her, and the father's emphasis on confirmation of his paternity before engaging in services or assuming his parental role is but a further indication of his disinterest and the manner in which he has consistently placed his own interests above those of the child.
We discern no error in the judge's determination that the child's best interests were served by terminating the father's parental rights and approving DCF's permanency plan that calls for adoption of the child (and her biological siblings) by her preadoptive parents, with whom she has lived and thrived. See Adoption of Dora, 52 Mass.App.Ct. 472, 474 (2001) (in addition to parental unfitness, judge must consider whether DCF plan is in child's best interests).
Those children have different fathers and are not involved in this appeal.
Decree affirmed.