Opinion
No. 1-989 / 01-1227.
Filed March 13, 2002.
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, KARLA J. FULTZ, Associate Juvenile Judge.
A mother appeals a juvenile court order terminating her rights to parent two children. AFFIRMED.
Scott Bandstra, Bandstra Law Firm, P.C., Des Moines, for appellant.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Mary Pippin, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee-State.
Charles Fuson, Youth Law Center, Des Moines, for minor children.
Considered by HUITINK, P.J., and ZIMMER and VAITHESWARAN, JJ.
A mother appeals a juvenile court order terminating her rights to parent two children. We affirm.
I. Background Facts and Proceedings
Kimberly has two children: Elizabeth, born in 1995, and Samantha, born in 1997. Kimberly is addicted to methamphetamine.
When Samantha was two, the Altoona police found her in a motel room with a man who had drugs and drug paraphernalia in his possession. The man told police Kimberly had left the toddler with him for almost twenty-four hours.
Police took Samantha to the station house and notified the Department of Human Services. Kimberly was contacted and was advised to retrieve her child. When she did not come to the station, the department placed Samantha in foster care and issued a founded child abuse report against Kimberly for denial of critical care. Meanwhile, the department determined that the older child, Elizabeth, had been in her grandmother's care for the previous two weeks, as Kimberly lacked a stable residence.
The juvenile court adjudicated both children in need of assistance and ordered them placed with their respective fathers. The court further ordered Kimberly to undergo a psychosocial evaluation and provide urine samples twice a week. Kimberly only sporadically complied with her court-ordered obligations. She also declined to take full advantage of the department's offer of supervised visitation.
Within three months of the children's removal, Kimberly was arrested and jailed on drug-related charges. By the time of her release, she had not seen the children for five months.
Kimberly was placed on work release and began addiction treatment through an outpatient facility. The facility discharged her within a week because she appeared unwilling to deal with her addiction. A halfway house to which she was sent also discharged her for failure to address her treatment needs. Following her discharge, Kimberly had little contact with social workers and did not exercise regular visitation with the children.
The State petitioned to terminate Kimberly's parental rights. The juvenile court granted the petition and terminated her parental rights under Iowa Code sections 232.116 (1)(b)(abandonment), (e)(child four or older cannot be returned to home), (g)(child three or younger cannot be returned to home), and (k) (substance abuse prevents return of child within a reasonable time) (1999). Our review of her appeal is de novo. In re A.Y.H., 508 N.W.2d 92, 94 (Iowa Ct. App. 1993).
II. Grounds for Termination
Kimberly maintains there was insufficient evidence to establish she abandoned the children under section 232.116(1)(b) or that the children could not be returned to her under sections 232.116(1)(e) and (g). She does not challenge the juvenile court's decision to terminate her rights under section 232.116(1)(k) (substance abuse). The State argues, therefore, that the termination may be affirmed on the basis of this unchallenged ground. In re S.R., 600 N.W.2d 63, 64 (Iowa Ct. App. 1999). We agree.
Although Kimberly claimed she did not use drugs after she was arrested, her post-arrest conduct suggests she had not come to terms with her addiction. See In re A.J., 553 N.W.2d 909, 914-15 (Iowa Ct. App. 1996). Kimberly testified she used methamphetamine for the first time when she was fourteen years old. By the time she was arrested at the age of twenty she admitted to using the drug "pretty close to daily." While the urine samples she provided the department were negative, at least one had been diluted and there were large blocks of time when she furnished no samples. Additionally, Kimberly did not complete either treatment program she attended. See In re J.K., 495 N.W.2d 108, 109-10 (Iowa 1993). After reviewing the record de novo, we agree with the juvenile court's decision to terminate her rights on the basis of chronic substance abuse. Accordingly, we need not address the remaining grounds on which the juvenile court relied.
III. Children's Best Interests
Kimberly contends that even if the statutory elements supporting termination are met, it was not in the children's best interests to terminate Kimberly's parental rights, given the strong parent-child bond. See Iowa Code § 232.116(3)(c). There is no question that the children love their mother and she loves them. But in the eighteen months that the children were out of her care, they also developed strong bonds with their respective fathers and paternal grandparents, as well as a sense of stability and security that service providers said would be jeopardized by ongoing contact with Kimberly. Therefore, we agree with the juvenile court that the children's best interests were served by termination of Kimberly's parental rights.
AFFIRMED.