Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
ORIGINAL PROCEEDINGS; petition for extraordinary writ review Super. Ct. No. JP000101, John D. Kirihara, Judge.
Bianca R., in pro. per., for Petitioner.
No appearance for Respondent.
James N. Fincher, County Counsel, and James B. Tarhalla, Deputy County Counsel, for Real Party in Interest.
OPINION
Before Kane, Acting P.J., Poochigian, J., and Detjen, J.
Petitioner seeks an extraordinary writ (Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.452) from the juvenile court’s orders issued at a contested 12-month review hearing terminating reunification services and setting a Welfare and Institutions Code section 366.26 hearing as to her daughter Bella. We will deny the petition.
All further statutory references are to the Welfare and Institutions Code unless otherwise indicated.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE AND FACTS
These dependency proceedings were initiated in October 2009 when petitioner was arrested after a physical altercation with her then live-in boyfriend, Paul, a registered sex offender. The Merced County Human Services Agency (agency) took then 10-month-old Bella into protective custody and filed a dependency petition on her behalf alleging petitioner placed her at risk of physical and sexual abuse. (§ 300, subds. (b) & (d).) The whereabouts of Bella’s alleged father, Marco, were initially unknown.
Bella is not the first of petitioner’s children removed from her custody. Petitioner has three other minor daughters who are not in her custody and for whom she received approximately 30 months of court-ordered family reunification services from August 2003 to February 2006. Services included substance abuse treatment, anger management, mental health counseling and parenting classes. However, petitioner did not complete them.
In its report for the detention hearing, the agency reported that petitioner displayed poor judgment in her choice of caregivers for Bella. Not only was Paul a registered sex offender, but he told petitioner he served 25 years in prison for murdering his wife.
In October 2009, the juvenile court ordered Bella detained pursuant to the petition and the agency placed her in foster care. Petitioner submitted a hair follicle for drug testing and the results were negative.
The juvenile court also set a combined jurisdictional/dispositional hearing which it conducted as a contested hearing in February 2010. Meanwhile, Marco appeared and elevated his status to presumed father. Also, petitioner was evaluated by two psychologists who diagnosed her with a personality disorder with histrionic and antisocial features and concluded she suffers from a mental disability. Both psychologists additionally concluded that it was unlikely petitioner would benefit from reunification services. One of the psychologists opined that petitioner’s disorder inclined her to antisocial and impulsive behavior which adversely affected her judgment. As a result, she was prone to abusive relationships with men and likely to subject a child to harm or abuse. In its report for the dispositional hearing, the agency recommended the court offer Marco reunification services, but deny petitioner services in light of her mental disability.
In February 2010, at the contested jurisdictional/dispositional hearing, the juvenile court heard testimony that in 2008, petitioner enrolled in parenting classes and anger management and domestic violence counseling. Though she completed the required classes and counseling sessions, she continued to participate in these services. The therapist who monitored petitioner’s progress testified that her efforts were “exceptional.”
Petitioner testified that she met with therapist Kirstin Armstrong-Propes every other week. She said she previously failed to complete services because she was “high” on methamphetamine, which was no longer the case. She said she lived with Paul for only six weeks and was in the process of breaking up with him when Bella was detained. She had since severed their relationship.
The juvenile court adjudged Bella a dependent child pursuant to the petition and ordered reunification services for petitioner and Marco. As part of petitioner’s services plan, she was required to continue in therapy with Ms. Armstrong-Propes to “improve her decision making skills” and “increase her impulse control.” Petitioner signed her services plan and the social worker made the necessary referrals.
Over the course of the ensuing months, petitioner participated in her case plan requirements and tested negative for drugs. She also regularly visited Bella who was, by this time, placed with one of her sisters. In addition, petitioner had obtained a home but was too transient to allow for overnight visitation.
In September 2010, at the six-month review hearing (review hearing), the juvenile court continued reunification services for petitioner and Marco to the 12-month review hearing which it set for February 2011. Not long after the review hearing, the agency began arranging unsupervised visitation for petitioner which ultimately progressed to overnight visitation.
In January 2011, petitioner was involved in a domestic violence situation with her boyfriend, Oscar, in which petitioner was the aggressor. Oscar called the police to report that petitioner was verbally and physically confrontational with him and destroyed his property. Oscar reported that Bella was present and witnessed petitioner’s behavior. The police did not detain Bella and allowed Oscar to transport petitioner and Bella to petitioner’s home.
In February 2011, Ms. Armstrong-Propes authored a letter to the agency reporting that petitioner had been her patient since March 2008 and that her treatment continued to focus on the recognition of “red flags” as well as on “rational decision making and [the] appropriate expression of anger.” She stated that petitioner continued to “make commendable progress” and she observed petitioner’s “substantial personal growth.”
The agency, however, saw no evidence that petitioner’s personal growth extended to her everyday life. In addition to her incident with Oscar, the agency reported that she stated on her Facebook web-page that she wanted to “sock and break someone’s face.” The agency recommended the juvenile court terminate petitioner and Marco’s reunification services at the 12-month review hearing.
In April 2011, the juvenile court conducted a contested 12-month review hearing and heard, among other testimony, additional detail with respect to the incident at Oscar’s home. Oscar and petitioner provided the same account of the events. Oscar, an artist, exhibited some of his paintings, including one of his ex-girlfriend/associate. Petitioner became angry and destroyed some of his paintings. They both claimed Bella was not in the room during the confrontation. Oscar said they were still in a relationship. The social worker testified that the threat petitioner posted on her Facebook web-page was a threat against Oscar’s ex-girlfriend, the one featured in his painting.
Petitioner testified she would have behaved differently with Oscar if given the chance. She said she would have left his home and would not have destroyed his paintings. She also testified that she was still in counseling with Ms. Armstrong-Propes. Asked whether she reviewed her case plan with Ms. Armstrong-Propes, petitioner stated they never specifically discussed it, but that Ms. Armstrong-Propes “knew what was going on.” She also testified that she told Ms. Armstrong-Propes about the Facebook posting and her incident with Oscar.
At the conclusion of the hearing, the juvenile court found that petitioner received reasonable services, but made minimal progress. The court terminated reunification services for petitioner and Marco and set a section 366.26 hearing. This petition ensued.
Marco did not file a writ petition.
DISCUSSION
Petitioner contends the social worker did not provide Ms. Armstrong-Propes a referral explaining what the agency expected them to address in counseling. Distilled to its essence and construed in favor of its sufficiency, the petition challenges the reasonableness of the agency’s efforts to provide petitioner mental health services. Petitioner seeks relief from the section 366.26 hearing and an order continuing reunification services. We find no error on this record and deny the petition for the reasons set forth below.
Real party in interest argues the petition should be dismissed as facially inadequate for failure to comply with the content requirements of California Rules of Court, rule 8.452. We decline to do so in this case.
The agency had a duty to assist petitioner in accessing her court-ordered services and satisfy the objectives of her services plan. (In re Riva M. (1991) 235 Cal.App.3d 403, 414.) Part of that duty included initiating referrals for services where necessary. Although the appellate record does not specify that the social worker provided Ms. Armstrong-Propes a referral, such an inference could be made from the following statement contained in the agency’s report for the six-month review hearing: “On March 8, 2010, [petitioner] signed the Child Welfare Plan. The assigned social worker provided referrals to the necessary providers in order to assist [petitioner] in the completion of her Family Reunification case plan components.”
However, even if the “necessary providers” did not include Ms. Armstrong-Propes, there is evidence that she knew what petitioner needed to work on and that they worked on those issues. Petitioner’s services plan required her to “improve her decision making skills” and “increase her impulse control” through therapy with Ms. Armstrong-Propes. In her February 2011 report of petitioner’s status, Ms. Armstrong-Propes stated that petitioner’s therapy focused on these issues, though phrased slightly differently: “rational decision making and [the] appropriate expression of anger.” In addition, petitioner testified in reference to the specifics of her case plan that Ms. Armstrong-Propes “knew what was going on.” Consequently, whether Ms. Armstrong-Propes had a referral is irrelevant since she nevertheless knew what the agency required of petitioner vis-à-vis mental health counseling.
We conclude, based on the foregoing, that petitioner was provided reasonable mental health services. Therefore, the juvenile court did not err in so finding or in terminating petitioner’s reunification services and setting a section 366.26 hearing.
DISPOSITION
The petition for extraordinary writ is denied. This opinion is final forthwith as to this court.