Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS
APPEAL from the Superior Court of San Bernardino County. Jerry Walker, Temporary Judge. (Pursuant to Cal. Const., art. VI, § 21.), Super.Ct.No. J206532.
Konrad S. Lee, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Ruth E. Stringer, County Counsel, and Danielle E. Wuchenich, Deputy County Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
Leslie A. Barry, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Minors.
OPINION
McKINSTER, J.
Defendant and appellant Alfred M. (father) is the natural father of three children who are dependents of the juvenile court. He appeals after the juvenile court terminated his reunification services and ordered a permanent planned living arrangement as the most appropriate plan for the children. Father appeals contending that plaintiff and respondent, San Bernardino County Department of Children’s Services (DCS), did not provide him with adequate reunification services. We affirm.
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
In February 2006, a social worker visited the mother and her three children. At the time, the family was living in a substandard backyard shelter. The mother, who claimed to have been drug free for one year, tested positive for methamphetamine on the date of the visit. The social worker removed the children.
The family history, supplied by the mother, indicated that the mother and father had been married for 12 years. They had separated approximately four years earlier, however, because of father’s domestic violence against the mother and one of their children. The social worker initiated an absent parent search by contacting father’s relatives. The social worker filed dependency petitions for the three children.
At a detention hearing, the juvenile court ordered the children detained in foster care and ordered services for father, including unsupervised visitation. The court ordered DCS to assess father’s home and, if DCS found it appropriate, to place the children with him. Father appeared at the detention hearing; he informed the court that he had completed a form giving his mailing address. The court ordered father to keep the court apprised of his address at all times.
The social worker’s report, prepared for the jurisdictional and dispositional hearing, described the relationship between the mother and father: They had married when the mother was 19 years old. Both before and after the marriage, father would abuse the mother, and would become violent when he drank. In one instance, father beat the mother, ordered the children to sit on the couch, and sent the oldest child to get a crowbar from the car. Father told the children to say goodbye to their mother, as he intended to kill her. Father stabbed the mother in the back of the leg with a knife. Father was convicted of felony spousal abuse in 2000 and sentenced to two years in state prison. At the time of the report, father and his new girlfriend were living in Visalia. They had no telephone.
The social worker discussed the dependency case with father’s parole agent. Father had not visited with the children since the detention hearing, some four weeks before the jurisdictional and dispositional report was prepared.
Father did not appear at the jurisdictional and dispositional hearing, set for March 16, 2006, nor at a continued hearing on March 29. Father’s attorney asked for a continuance to contact father concerning the amended petitions that had been filed. Father again failed to appear at the continued jurisdictional and dispositional hearing on April 17, 2006. Father’s attorney asked for a continuance, as father had claimed to have problems arranging transportation. The court found no good cause for a continuance, and noted that father had also failed to appear at the mandatory pretrial conference on April 14, 2006.
Father’s attorney objected to the social worker’s jurisdictional and dispositional report, but proffered no affirmative evidence. The juvenile court ordered DCS to provide reunification services to the parents, and ordered the parents to participate in their service plans. The services included court-ordered monthly visitation between father and the children.
In a report dated October 16, 2006, prepared for the six-month review hearing, DCS recommended that further services be provided. The report indicated that father had been incarcerated, but had been released on September 29, 2006. During the first six months of the reunification period, father had not contacted DCS, had not participated in his service plan, and had not visited the children. Father’s whereabouts were unknown at the time of the report.
Father failed to appear at the six-month review hearing. The court found that DCS had offered reasonable reunification services, but that the parents had failed to complete any of the elements of their service plans.
DCS prepared a report in advance of the 12-month review hearing in April 2007. The social worker recommended terminating reunification services as to both parents, and that the court order long-term foster care as the permanent plan for the children. The social worker had initiated an absent parent search for father in November 2006, but had received no responses. On March 28, 2007, about three weeks before the scheduled 12-month review hearing, the social worker had again done a prison search, and this time discovered that father had been incarcerated since September 28, 2006, with an expected release date in 2010. The social worker sent a contact letter to father. DCS reported that father had made no progress on his service plan.
Father did not appear at the 12-month review hearing, on April 17, 2007. He was still incarcerated. Father’s attorney objected on his behalf, but presented no affirmative evidence. As neither parent had made progress in reunification, the children would be placed with relatives in a planned permanent living arrangement.
The court found by clear and convincing evidence that father had failed to make substantive progress on his reunification plan. His progress had been minimal. The court found that reasonable efforts had been made to provide appropriate services, and terminated father’s reunification services.
Father now appeals, asserting that DCS did not provide adequate services.
ANALYSIS
I. Standard of Review
“[W]ith regard to the sufficiency of reunification services, our sole task on review is to determine whether the record discloses substantial evidence which supports the juvenile court’s finding that reasonable services were provided or offered.” (Angela S. v. Superior Court (1995) 36 Cal.App.4th 758, 762.)
II. Substantial Evidence Supports the Court’s Finding That Reasonable Reunification Services Were Offered
Father was incarcerated during the last six months of the reunification period without providing notice to the court or DCS, even though he had specifically been ordered to keep them apprised of his address at all times. Father had not seen the children for about five years before the dependency began. Although offered visitation, he failed to visit with them except perfunctorily during the dependency period. In the six-month review report, as of October 2006, father had failed to visit the children in the last five months.
No one had any reason to suspect at that time that father had been incarcerated. Father failed to notify the court or DCS. Father’s own attorney had been unable to maintain contact with father. DCS sent out an absent parent search, but received no replies.
In March 2007, when the social worker conducted a new search, it was discovered that father had been incarcerated since September 2006, with a release date expected in 2010.
Although father’s attorney objected to the social worker’s report, and to the recommendation for terminating services (counsel objected “for the record”), counsel offered no affirmative evidence or any reason why services should not be terminated.
The court found by clear and convincing evidence that father had failed to make any substantive progress on his treatment plan.
Father proffers no excuse for his failure to notify DCS of his incarceration, and his failure to request any modifications in his service plan to accommodate his incarcerated status. Under the circumstances, the facts do not support father’s claim that DCS failed to provide him with reasonable services.
Father’s contention on appeal hinges solely on the complaint that DCS had a duty or obligation to locate him as a prisoner. In re Maria S. (2000) 82 Cal.App.4th 1032, is inapposite. There, a mother gave birth to a child while incarcerated. The record was devoid of any evidence to suggest what services, if any, were identified as available or offered to the mother during her incarceration. No evidence suggested that the mother refused or failed to cooperate in any way with the case plan while she remained incarcerated.
Here, father’s case plan was initiated before his incarceration. The sole reason that DCS did not provide him with services appropriate and available while he was incarcerated was father’s failure to inform anyone of his in-custody address.
This case parallels In re Raymond R. (1994) 26 Cal.App.4th 436. There, the court explained that, although a social services department has a duty initially to make a good faith attempt to locate parents of a dependent child (e.g., a prison search), once a parent has been located, it is the parent’s obligation to communicate with the department and participate in the reunification process. (Id. at p. 441.) That is exactly the situation here. DCS properly conducted a search for father, and found him living in Visalia with his girlfriend. Once that had happened, it was father’s obligation, as he was expressly admonished by the court, to keep the court and DCS apprised at all times of any changes in his address.
The juvenile court properly found that reasonable reunification services were offered.
DISPOSITION
The order terminating father’s reunification services is affirmed.
We concur: RAMIREZ, P. J., GAUT, J.