Dept. of Human Services v. T. D. ( 2020 )

470
Submitted August 11; reversed and remanded for entry of judgment omitting
allegation 2(A), otherwise affirmed September 10, 2020
In the Matter of A. Z.,
a Child.
DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES,
Petitioner-Respondent,
v.
T. D.,
Appellant.
Umatilla County Circuit Court
19JU07599; A173634
473 P3d 1165
Robert W. Collins, Jr., Judge.
Shannon Storey, Chief Defender, Juvenile Appellate
Section, and Holly Telerant, Deputy Public Defender, Office
of Public Defense Services, filed the briefs for appellant.
Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, Benjamin Gutman,
Solicitor General, and Christopher Page, Assistant Attorney
General, filed the brief for respondent.
Before Lagesen, Presiding Judge, and Kamins, Judge, and
Kistler, Senior Judge.
PER CURIAM
Reversed and remanded for entry of judgment omitting
allegation 2(A); otherwise affirmed.
Cite as 306 Or App 470 (2020) 471
PER CURIAM
Mother appeals a judgment of jurisdiction and
disposition with regard to her son, A, advancing seven
assignments of error. After she appealed the judgment, the
Department of Human Services (DHS) filed a motion in the
juvenile court to terminate wardship and dismiss juvenile
court jurisdiction because A had been living with father,
A was doing well, and wardship was no longer in his best
interest. The juvenile court granted the motion and entered
a judgment that terminated jurisdiction and dismissed the
dependency proceedings.
In light of those developments, DHS moved to dis-
miss mother’s appeal as moot. Mother opposed the motion,
arguing that the juvenile court’s findings regarding the
bases for jurisdiction—the subject of mother’s second
through sixth assignments of error—have collateral conse-
quences for mother in a pending domestic relations case in
which father is seeking sole legal custody and an “immedi-
ate danger” order based on A’s removal from mother’s care
“due to neglect and abuse.” In reply, DHS conceded that the
appeal was not moot in its entirety, and that resolution of
the second through sixth assignments of error “could have
a practical effect on mother’s rights based on its import in
the domestic relations case.” See Dept. of Human Services
v. A. B., 362 Or 412, 414, 412 P3d 1169 (2018) (“If a parent
identifies practical effects or collateral consequences that
the parent believes will result from the judgment, then the
department has the burden to persuade the appellate court
that those consequences are factually incorrect or legally
insufficient.”). DHS’s motion to dismiss the appeal as moot
was subsequently denied.
With that procedural background, we consider the
merits of mother’s appeal with regard to her second through
sixth assignments of error, resolution of which could be
important to the domestic relations case.1 With respect to
mother’s second assignment, DHS concedes that the evi-
dence is insufficient to support the court’s finding that DHS
1
Although the appeal as a whole is not moot, mother has not identified how
resolution of her first and seventh assignments of error will have any practical
effect on her, and we do not address those moot assignments.
472 Dept. of Human Services v. T. D.
proved allegation 2(A) of the petition, which alleged that
“mother was subjected to domestic violence by the father
and the mother is unable to protect the child from expo-
sure to father’s violence.” We agree, accept the concession,
and reverse and remand for entry of judgment omitting that
jurisdictional basis. As for mother’s third through sixth
assignments, we affirm without discussion.
Reversed and remanded for entry of judgment omit-
ting allegation 2(A); otherwise affirmed.