In re H.S.
Filed 4/3/12 In re H.S. CA1/1
California
Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or
relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except
as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This
opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for
purposes of rule 8.1115.
IN
THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
FIRST
APPELLATE DISTRICT
DIVISION
ONE
In re H.S.,
a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.
SOLANO COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH
& SOCIAL SERVICES,
Plaintiff and Respondent,
v.
P.S.,
Defendant and Appellant.
A132452
(Solano
County
Super. Ct.
No. J40513)
Appellant
P.S. appeals the juvenile court’s order authorizing the
County Department of Health and Social Services (Department) the discretion
to place her son H.S. in an out-of-county placement. Because the order appealed from has been
rendered moot by subsequent events, we dismiss this appeal.
FACTUAL
BACKGROUND AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
We
have already summarized the underlying facts surrounding this dependency
proceeding in a prior opinion in this matter.
(In re H.S. (Jan. 5, 2012, A131537) [nonpub.
opn.].) In brief, H.S. was born to
appellant in November 2010. He was
placed in protective custody and ordered detained shortly after his birth. A dependency proceeding was initiated in
December 2010. After a contested
jurisdictional/dispositional hearing, the juvenile court found H.S. came within
Welfare and Institutions Code section 300, subdivisions (b) and (j).
services under section 361.5, subdivision (b), because services had been
terminated in connection with a prior dependency proceeding in which her
parental rights were ultimately terminated.
Additionally, she has a 20-year history of substance abuse along with a
history of resisting court-ordered treatment.
On
appeal, we upheld the juvenile court’s jurisdictional/dispositional
determinations, as well as its decision to deny appellant reunification
services. We also affirmed the court’s
order limiting her visits with her son to one per week, and found she had
waived the issue of whether the Department failed to exercise due diligence in
attempting to locate appropriate relatives for H.S.’s placement. (In re
H.S. (Jan. 5, 2012,
A131537) [nonpub. opn.].)
On
April 4, 2011, the
Department filed a request to change a court order pursuant to section
388. The Department’s social worker
indicated that the child was becoming increasingly attached to his current
foster mother who was not a concurrent foster home. A secondary adoption worker had reportedly
identified two prospective concurrent foster homes for the child, however, both
homes were located outside of Solano County. As the juvenile court’s dispositional order
specified that the child be placed in an approved home within the county, a modification
was required in order to allow the county to pursue these placement options.
On
June 2, 2011, counsel for
the Department advised the court that the proposed out-of-county placement was
located in Sacramento and that the
prospective foster parents were committed to bringing the child to Solano
County for parental
visitation. The juvenile court granted
the Department’s request.
On
June 21, 2011, appellant
filed a notice of appeal of the June 2, 2011 order authorizing the
out-of-county placement.
DISCUSSION
On
appeal, appellant claims the juvenile court abused its discretion in granting
the request of the department to change the disposition placement orders to
authorize out-of-county placement. She claims
the petition failed to state a change of circumstances and was not supported by
evidence that a new placement would be in the child’s best interest. She also reiterates the arguments raised in
her prior appeal regarding the Department’s alleged failure to exercise due
care to locate a relative placement. We
agree with the Department that the instant appeal is moot.
“An
appeal becomes moot when, through no fault of the respondent, the occurrence of
an event renders it impossible for the appellate court to grant the appellant
effective relief.” (In re Esperanza C. (2008) 165 Cal.App.4th 1042, 1054.) “However, a reviewing court may exercise its
inherent discretion to resolve an issue rendered moot by subsequent events if
the question to be decided is of continuing public importance and is a question
capable of repetition, yet evading review.
[Citations.] We decide on a
case-by-case basis whether subsequent events in a juvenile dependency matter
make a case moot and whether our decision would affect the outcome in a
subsequent proceeding.” (
1394, 1404.)
We
have granted the Department’s request for judicial notice of various documents
generated in this case since the date appellant’s notice of appeal was filed. We describe them below.
On
July 14, 2011, appellant
filed a notice of change of mailing
address. The new address is in the state
of Missouri. The change is significant in that appellant’s
primary argument against placing the child out-of-county was that it would
interfere with her visitation.
On
July 19, 2011, the
Department filed a six-month status review report. The report states that H.S.’s father reported
appellant had moved and was living in Missouri
with her parents. She had not visited
with the child since May 16, 2011. Additionally, at this time the child was
still living in a foster home located in Solano
County, in the same placement he
had resided at since December 8, 2010.
The
contested six-month review hearing was held on September 22, 2011.
The minutes indicate that the juvenile court attempted to contact
appellant via telephone with no success.
At the hearing, reunification
services to H.S.’s father were terminated and the matter was set for a
section 366.26 hearing.
On
September 28, 2011, the
juvenile court filed its findings and orders after hearing. As part of its orders, the court authorized
out-of-county placement.
From
the documents described above, it appears the Department did not exercise the
placement discretion granted to it under the June 2, 2011 order, as the child was still with his
in-county placement when the Department’s six-month status report was filed,
and there is no evidence this circumstance changed prior to the September 22, 2011 hearing. Thus, appellant suffered no prejudice as a
result of the order. Additionally, the September 28, 2011 order effectively
supersedes the prior order by again authorizing an out-of-county
placement. Even if we were to reverse
the June 2, 2011 order,
relief would be ineffective as the later order would remain in force. Finally, as appellant has voluntarily left
the state and is unavailable for visitation with her son we perceive no reason
to exercise our discretion to decide this matter on the merits. Accordingly, there is no possibility of
effective relief on appeal and the matter is moot.
DISPOSITION
The
appeal is dismissed as moot.
__________________________________
Dondero,
J.
We
concur:
__________________________________
Margulies,
Acting P. J.
__________________________________
Banke,
J.
name="_ftn1" title="">[1] All further statutory references are to the Welfare
and Institutions Code.
