Connors v. Arkansas Department of Human Services

2017 Ark. App. 579, 537 S.W.3d 736, 2017 Ark. App. LEXIS 647
CourtCourt of Appeals of Arkansas
DecidedNovember 1, 2017
DocketCV-17-557
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 2017 Ark. App. 579 (Connors v. Arkansas Department of Human Services) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Connors v. Arkansas Department of Human Services, 2017 Ark. App. 579, 537 S.W.3d 736, 2017 Ark. App. LEXIS 647 (Ark. Ct. App. 2017).

Opinion

LARRY D. VAUGHT, Judge

|iDerrick Connors appeals.the Pulaski County Circuit Court’s termination of his parental rights to his son, K.T. 1 On appeal, he challenges only the court’s best-interest finding, arguing that the Arkansas Department of Human Services (DHS) failed to introduce sufficient evidence of KT.’s adoptability and that the court failed to consider placement with a relatiye. We disagree and affirm.

DHS placed an emergency seventy-two hour hold on K.T. and his two half-siblings, J.T. and B.P., after his mother and B.P. both tested positive for illegal drugs at the time of B.P.’s birth. The children’s mother admitted using PCP during her pregnancy. Connors was and remained incarcerated throughout this case. The juveniles were adjudicated dependent-! aneglected, and the case proceeded through several review and permanency-planning hearings. At one such hearing, Connors was held in criminal contempt-of court for three separate outbursts. At another hearing, he appeared but stated that he did not want to be there and left.

Following a hearing on DHS’s first termination petition, the court terminated the parental rights of two other parents. involved in the case but denied the petition as to Connors because it found that DHS had failed to introduce sufficient evidence that services had been provided to Connors in prison or as to the length of his sentence. After the filing of a second termination petition and a hearing, the court granted DHS’s petition and terminated Connors’s parental rights. This appeal followed.'-

Termination-of-parental-rights cases are reviewed de novo. Hune v. Ark. Dep’t of Human Servs., 2010 Ark. App. 543, 2010 WL 2612681. The appellate inquiry is whethér the trial court’s finding that the disputed fact was proved by clear and convincing evidence is clearly erroneous. J.T. v. Ark. Dep’t of Human Servs., 329 Ark. 243, 248, 947 S.W.2d 761, 763 (1997). A finding is clearly erroneous when, although there is evidence to support it, the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with a definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been made. Id., 947 S.W.2d at 763. In resolving the clearly erroneous question, we give -due regard to the opportunity of the trial court to judge the credibility of witnesses. Camarillo-Cox v. Ark. Dep’t of Human Servs., 360 Ark. 340, 352, 201 S.W.3d 391, 399 (2005). Termination of parental rights is an extreme remedy and in derogation of a parent’s natural rights; however, parental rights will not be enforced to the detriment or destruction of the health and well-being of the child. Meriweather v. Ark. Dep’t of Health & Human Servs., 98 Ark. App. 328, 331, 255 S.W.3d 505, 507 (2007).

|,qOn appeal, Connors does not challenge the court’s findings as to the statutory grounds for termination; he argues only that the court’s best-interest determination was clearly erroneous because (1) there was insufficient evidence of adopta-bility and (2) it did not consider relative placement as an alternative. As to adopta-bility, Connors specifically argues that, although a DHS caseworker testified that she had run KT.’s characteristics through a computer database of potential adoptive parents and found 125 families that would be interested in adopting children like K.T., this evidence failed to take into account K.T.’s sexual aggression.

This argument fails for two reasons. First, adoptability is not an element that must b.e proved but is simply a factor that must be considered in determining the child’s best interest. A best-interest finding under the Arkansas Juvenile Code must be based on the consideration of two factors, the first of which is the child’s likelihood of adoption. Ark. Code Ann. § 9-27-341(b)(3)(A)(i) (Repl. 2015). Adopt-ability is not a required finding, and likelihood of adoption does not have to be proved by clear and convincing evidence. Duckery v. Ark. Dep’t of Human Servs., 2016 Ark. App. 358, at 5-6, 2016 WL 4455696. We have previously explained that the Juvenile Code does not require “any ‘magic words’ or a specific quantum of evidence” to support a finding as to likelihood of adoption. Sharks v. Ark Dep’t of Human Servs., 2016 Ark. App. 435, at 8, 502 S.W.3d 569, 576. The law simply requires that the court consider adoptability and that if there is an adoptability finding, there must be evidence to support it. See Haynes v. Ark Dep’t of Human Servs., 2010 Ark. App. 28, at 4, 2010 WL 135194 (reversing a best-interest determination because no evidence of adoptability was introduced and the court failed to consider adoptability). The fact-.that adoptability is not a required element is consistent with the rule that termination of | ¿parental rights is proper even when there is little likelihood of adoption, if it is in the child’s best interest. McDaniel v. Ark Dep’t of Human Servs., 2013 Ark. App. 263, at 4-5, 2013 WL 1776479. Here, there is no dispute that the court considered adoptability and that evidence was presented on the issue.

Connors’s sole argument is that the evidence of adoptability was insufficient because it failed to account for KT.’s specific characteristics. Connors fails to cite any cases requiring such precision and specificity, nor are we aware of such precedent. Instead, Connors argues that this case is akin to Grant v. Arkansas Department of Human Services, 2010 Ark. App. 636, at 13, 378 S.W.3d 227, 233, in which we reversed a best-interest finding that was based solely on a caseworker’s testimony that “all children are adoptable” and failed to take into account the child’s autism. In the present case, unlike in Grant, DHS presented specific evidence as to KT.’s adoptability. The caseworker testified that when she ran the adoptability match, she selected for specific characteristics, such as K.T.’s age, race, and status as a member of a sibling group. Moreover, she testified about why she did not include sexual aggression in running the adoption match, which provided the circuit court with ample 'evidence to consider whether sexual aggression should have been included in the adoptability match.

■ Connors’s argument also fails because the DHS caseworker explained that she had not included sexual aggression for a very good reason: K.T. is not sexually aggressive. The evidence revealed that DHS had twice submitted K.T. for professional evaluations for sexual aggression and that both evaluations determined that he was not. sexually aggressive and needed no treatment for sexual aggression. In fact, the intake report from Bridgeway, indicating that -K.T. was not sexually aggressive, had previously been entered into evidence at a prior hearing without objection from Connors. As such, we see no error on this point.

UConnors’s second point on appeal is that the court failed to consider potential relative placement as an alternative to termination when making its best-interest finding. 2 Specifically, he argues that his sister was interested in taking K.T.

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2017 Ark. App. 579, 537 S.W.3d 736, 2017 Ark. App. LEXIS 647, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/connors-v-arkansas-department-of-human-services-arkctapp-2017.