Opinion
DOCKET NO. A-1469-15T3
12-05-2016
NEW JERSEY DIVISION OF CHILD PROTECTION AND PERMANENCY, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. C.B., Defendant-Appellant, and C.K., Defendant. IN THE MATTER OF THE GUARDIANSHIP OF C.B. and S.B., Minors.
Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, attorney for appellant (Christine Olexa Saginor, Designated Counsel, on the brief). Christopher S. Porrino, Attorney General, attorney for respondent (Andrea M. Silkowitz, Assistant Attorney General, of counsel; Lauren J. Oliverio, Deputy Attorney General, on the brief). Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, Law Guardian, attorney for minors (Charles Ouslander, Designated Counsel, on the brief).
RECORD IMPOUNDED
NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION
This opinion shall not "constitute precedent or be binding upon any court." Although it is posted on the internet, this opinion is binding only on the parties in the case and its use in other cases is limited. R.1:36-3. Before Judges Alvarez, Accurso and Manahan. On appeal from Superior Court of New Jersey, Chancery Division, Family Part, Hudson County, Docket No. FG-09-259-15. Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, attorney for appellant (Christine Olexa Saginor, Designated Counsel, on the brief). Christopher S. Porrino, Attorney General, attorney for respondent (Andrea M. Silkowitz, Assistant Attorney General, of counsel; Lauren J. Oliverio, Deputy Attorney General, on the brief). Joseph E. Krakora, Public Defender, Law Guardian, attorney for minors (Charles Ouslander, Designated Counsel, on the brief). PER CURIAM
Defendant C.B. appeals from a final judgment terminating her parental rights to her daughters, three-year-old Cynthia, and two-year-old Serena. She contends the Division of Child Protection and Permanency failed to prove the four prongs of the best interests standard of N.J.S.A. 30:4C-15.1a(1)-(4) by clear and convincing evidence. The Law Guardian joins with the Division in urging we affirm the judgment. Having considered defendant's arguments in light of the record and controlling law, we affirm the termination of her parental rights.
These names are fictitious to protect the children's identities. --------
Defendant has a long history with the Division. Her parental rights to her oldest child, now ten, were terminated in 2012, after she continued to test positive for phencyclidine (PCP) throughout the guardianship proceedings and failed to complete services to treat her addiction and long-standing mental health issues. She has since given birth to three more children, all born testing positive for PCP. Only defendant's rights to Cynthia and Serena are at issue in this case. Defendant's fourth child, a son, was born just two months before the guardianship trial. The court denied the Division's motion to add the new baby to the complaint in this matter.
Defendant has never had custody of either Cynthia or Serena. Cynthia was removed from her care upon release from the neonatal intensive care unit nine days after her birth. When the nursing staff tried to explain to defendant that she could not breastfeed because she had tested positive for PCP, she denied any drug use and claimed someone was "messing" with her medical records.
Serena suffered withdrawal symptoms at birth and required morphine until she was weaned off the PCP. During the seven weeks Serena remained in the hospital, defendant was belligerent to hospital staff, claimed she was assaulted by hospital security guards and injected with PCP, and stated she could not understand why people kept saying she was using drugs. She twice tested positive for PCP during that period.
Both Cynthia and Serena were placed with cousins of defendant, who wish to adopt them. Defendant was permitted therapeutic and supervised visitation with the girls. Although she could be affectionate, nurturing and caring of her daughters, visitation did not initially go well. Defendant did not attend regularly, and the provider concluded she posed an increasing risk to the children by refusing intervention or redirection when she jabbed Serena's bottle into her mouth, grasped her by the neck while holding her upright in a sitting position and pushed down on her swollen umbilical cord area saying it would make her feel better. Therapeutic visitation was restarted and defendant attended regularly until several weeks before the guardianship trial when she inexplicably began appearing on the wrong day.
Defendant refused a psychiatric evaluation and substance abuse assessments. The Division caseworker testified at the guardianship trial that defendant failed to avail herself of any mental health services offered by the Division and had not completed a drug treatment program since the Division's first efforts to enroll her in 2011.
The Division's expert psychologist, Dr. Wells, who was able to conduct both a psychological assessment and a bonding evaluation in 2015, testified there had been no improvement in defendant's mental health and substance abuse since 2011, when the doctor first evaluated her in connection with the termination of her rights to her eldest child. Dr. Wells concluded defendant suffered from a delusional disorder evidenced by paranoid symptoms that included mixed jealousy and persecutory beliefs. She testified that defendant's level of "cognitive distortions," would not permit effective parenting. Further, those deficits, coupled with the severe dissociative effects of PCP, posed "unimaginable risks" to any children in her care. The doctor further opined that defendant's "failure to perceive that she has any impairment in psychological functioning, severely impacts on her ability to appreciat[e] any potential benefits to engaging in services designed to address her mental health or substance abuse issues." She concluded that defendant's "ability to sustain care in a safe and stable environment [was] minimal to nonexistent," a situation she did not find likely to change in the foreseeable future.
With regard to bonding, Dr. Wells testified that although defendant loved her children and had a maternal understanding that she was the girls' mother, neither of the children had a secure and intact bond with her, and neither would suffer any harm were defendant's parental rights terminated. In contrast, the doctor found both Cynthia and Serena securely bonded to their respective resource parents and explained they would suffer acute distress, which defendant was not equipped to mitigate, if removed from their care. Ultimately, Dr. Wells opined that delaying permanency for defendant's daughters was not in their best interests.
Defendant did not present any expert testimony to counter the opinions of the Division's expert. Although defendant testified in her own behalf, the trial judge described the testimony as "disjointed" and "not mak[ing] a lot of sense." Defendant denied needing drug treatment and although claiming she had purchased a home in Pennsylvania where she planned to live with her daughters, she could not provide an address or any other information as to where the house was located.
After hearing the testimony, the court concluded the Division had carried its burden of clear and convincing proof on all four prongs of the best interests test. The court found defendant's daughters had "[u]ndoubtedly . . . been harmed by [defendant's] inability to remain drug free and failure to address [her] mental health issues." It found defendant demonstrated that she is unwilling or unable to correct the harm, noting defendant still does not believe she has any parenting deficits and continues to be non-compliant. The court reviewed the many efforts the Division made to assist her, finding those efforts more than reasonable and that no alternatives existed to termination. Finally, the court concluded that defendant would not "be fit to serve as a safe and stable resource for [her] children in the foreseeable future," that termination would not do more harm than good and thus that termination of defendant's rights was in the children's best interests.
Our review of a trial court's decision to terminate parental rights is limited. N.J. Div. of Youth & Family Servs. v. F.M., 211 N.J. 420, 448-49 (2012). We generally "defer to the factual findings of the trial court because it has the opportunity to make first-hand credibility judgments about the witnesses who appear on the stand; it has a 'feel of the case' that can never be realized by a review of the cold record." N.J. Div. of Youth & Family Servs. v. E.P., 196 N.J. 88, 104 (2008) (quoting N.J. Div. of Youth & Family Servs. v. M.M., 189 N.J. 261, 293 (2007)).
Having reviewed the record, we are convinced that the judge's findings are amply supported by the trial testimony. Defendant has never been in a position to provide these children with a safe and stable home. The girls, both removed from their mother at birth, are now two and three and entitled to the stability that adoption promises.
Defendant suffers from significant and long-standing psychological problems, severely exacerbated by her addiction to PCP, that unquestionably put these children at significant risk of harm. Her failure to obtain treatment for her mental health issues and utter unwillingness to even admit the existence of an untreated drug addiction make abundantly clear that she cannot or will not remediate the harm she poses to them. Although "[m]ental illness, alone, does not disqualify a parent from raising a child, . . . it is a different matter if a parent refuses to treat [her] mental illness" and it "poses a real threat to a child." F.M., supra, 211 N.J. at 450-51.
We are satisfied that the record supports the judge's findings that defendant refused and failed to complete the services offered and that termination of her parental rights will not do more harm than good. We affirm the judgment substantially for the reasons expressed by Judge DeCastro in her written opinion of November 18, 2015.
Affirmed. I hereby certify that the foregoing is a true copy of the original on file in my office.
CLERK OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION