Opinion
No. 5-280 / 05-0177
Filed April 13, 2005
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Woodbury County, Brian L. Michaelson, Associate Juvenile Judge.
A mother appeals from a juvenile court order which terminated her parental rights to her son. AFFIRMED.
H. Allan Sturgeon, Sioux City, for appellant-mother.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Kathrine Miller-Todd, Assistant Attorney General, Thomas S. Mullin, County Attorney, and Cindy Weber-Blair, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.
Michelle Dreibelbis, Sioux City, for child.
Considered by Sackett, C.J., and Zimmer and Hecht, JJ.
Rosaura M.-B. appeals a juvenile court order which terminated her parental rights to her son. She contends the State failed to prove the statutory grounds for termination of her parental rights. Upon our de novo review of the record, we affirm the juvenile court.
Rosaura is the mother of a son, H.L., III, born in May 2003. The child came to the attention of the Department of Human Services during February 2004 when his mother was arrested on drug charges and for illegal immigration. When Rosaura was arrested she claimed she did not know who the child's father was and she gave police a false name for her child. Police detectives found razor blades and drug money in the child's diaper bag. The juvenile court removed H.L., III from his mother's care and placed him in foster care. The court adjudicated H.L., III as a child in need of assistance in April 2004. On August 27, 2004, the State filed a petition to terminate Rosaura's parental rights.
The child's birth certificate identifies Hector L. Jr. as the child's father.
Following a contested hearing, the juvenile court entered an order on January 11, 2005, terminating Rosaura's parental rights pursuant to Iowa Code sections 232.116(1)(b), (d), (h), (i), and (l) (2003). The father's parental rights were also terminated. Only Rosaura appeals.
We review termination proceedings de novo. In re S.N., 500 N.W.2d 32, 34 (Iowa 1993). The grounds for termination must be proven by clear and convincing evidence. In re T.B., 604 N.W.2d 660, 661 (Iowa 2001). Our primary concern is the best interests of the child. In re C.B., 611 N.W.2d 489, 492 (Iowa 2000).
On appeal, Rosaura contends the State failed to prove the statutory grounds relied on by the juvenile court for termination of her parental rights by clear and convincing evidence. She argues "she can be successfully reunited with her child in a timely manner." We disagree.
Upon de novo review of the record, we conclude the juvenile court properly terminated the mother's parental rights under section 232.116(1)(h) (child is three or younger, child in need of assistance, removed from home for six of last twelve months, and cannot be returned to parent's custody). Rosaura, age twenty, is an undocumented foreign national who entered the United States illegally before giving birth to her son. She has been incarcerated since her arrest February 2004. Rosaura was sentenced to serve ten years in prison in October of 2004 for the crimes of Conspiracy to Distribute 500 grams or more of Methamphetamine Mixture and Possession of a Firearm During a Drug Trafficking Crime. When the termination hearing was held in January 2005, the mother was confined in a federal correctional facility in California. The record indicates Rosaura will be deported after she serves at least five years of her current sentence. Clear and convincing evidence supports the juvenile court's finding that H.L., III cannot be returned to his mother's custody. In addition, termination of Rosaura's parental rights is clearly in her son's best interests.
The mother was previously deported from the United States to Mexico at the age of thirteen following her arrest for assault with a deadly weapon.
Because we conclude the mother's parental rights were properly terminated under section 232.116(1)(h), we need not address the other grounds for termination relied on by the juvenile court. See In re S.R., 600 N.W.2d 63, 64 (Iowa Ct.App. 1999) (When juvenile court terminates parental rights on more than one statutory ground, we need only find grounds to terminate under one of the sections cited by the juvenile court to affirm).
We note that the mother's petition on appeal fails to contest three of the five satutuory grounds for termination relied on by the juvenile court. Her failure to contest those grounds on appeal also serves as a basis for affirming the ruling of the juvenile court.
We affirm the juvenile court.