In re S.V.













Filed 10/7/10 In re S.V. CA2/8











NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS



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opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for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



SECOND APPELLATE
DISTRICT



DIVISION EIGHT




>

In re S.V., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law.	B220834
LOS ANGELES COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND FAMILY SERVICES, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. R.V., Defendant and Appellant.	(Los Angeles County Super. Ct. No. CK 78995)

Appeal
from an order of the Superior Court
of Los Angeles
County. Valerie L.
Skeba, Juvenile Court Referee. (Pursuant
to Cal. Const., art. VI,
§ 21.) Affirmed.

Thomas
S. Szakall, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and
Appellant.

Andrea
Sheridan Ordin, County Counsel, James M. Owens, Assistant County Counsel, and
Tracey F. Dodds, Deputy County Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.



* *
* * * *

R.V., the father
of two children, appeals from the juvenile court adjudication of a dependency
petition finding he placed his children at substantial risk of serious physical injury. We conclude the juvenile court did not abuse
its discretion and affirm the adjudication and disposition granting legal and physical custody of the
children to their mother and terminating jurisdiction pursuant to a family law
order.

>BACKGROUND

The
two children, S.V. and her brother, came to the attention of the Department of Children and Family Services
(Department) in September 2009 after father made two unsubstantiated and one
demonstrably false accusation that S.V. had been sexually abused by the
boyfriend of the children's mother.
Before the filing in this case, there had been five previous dependency
investigations of the family. In January
2005, social workers in Orange County
became involved after father was arrested for domestic violence upon mother in
S.V.'s presence. The couple had a
difficult relationship, which ended in late 2007, and mother obtained a family
law court order for joint custody of the children in early 2008.

Father and mother
shared custody of the children without dispute until late 2008 or early 2009
when father discovered mother was dating Cesar G. Shortly thereafter, the first report was made
that S.V. had been sexually abused; apparently father or a paternal relative
reported that S.V.'s seven-year-old maternal cousin abused her. The report was investigated but never
substantiated. There were two reports in
March and June 2009 that mother slapped S.V. and pulled her hair and that
mother left the children at home unsupervised.
Father then obtained a family law order modifying the custody
arrangement so that father had primary custody of the children, and mother had
the children for two weekends every month.


In July 2009,
father filed a request for a temporary
restraining order against mother and Cesar.
A week later, father made his first report that Cesar had sexually
abused S.V. Father took S.V. with him to
the police station on July 28, claiming that Cesar had touched S.V. on the
vagina and cut her with his fingernail on June 27, leaving a bloody discharge
in her panties. Father told the two
investigating officers he took S.V. to Children's Hospital for a sex-abuse examination
and questioning by a social worker. The
doctors found no sign of abuse, nor did they observe a scratch on or near
S.V.'s vagina. The police investigators
interviewed S.V. at the station. She was
five years old at the time. S.V. said
she would tell the police what her father had already told them, that Cesar
touched her between her legs on the outside of her pants and cut her with his
long fingernail. S.V. said her father
did not tell her what to say but reminded her what to say.

Children's
Hospital arranged for a forensic interview of S.V. on August 5, 2009.
During the interview, S.V. told the examiner that she had been molested
by Cesar and that she had been told what to say by her father and paternal
grandmother. Consequently, S.V.
underwent a second physical examination, based on her continued allegations of
sexual abuse. The physical exam
disclosed no abnormalities suggesting sexual molestation.

Father's
application for a permanent restraining order was heard in court and denied on August 7, 2009. S.V. and her brother again spent the night
with their mother on August 8 and 9. Two
days later, father again took S.V. to the police station to report Cesar abused
S.V. The second report was almost identical
to the first. Father obtained a second
temporary restraining order against mother and Cesar on August 21, 2009.
The hearing on the application for permanent restraining order was set
for mid-October. Father did not take the
children to visit their mother the weekend after he obtained the second
temporary restraining order. He took his
son the last weekend in August but not S.V. because she had a cold.

Father consented
to both children visiting their mother the weekend of September 11 through
13, 2009. Before the visit, with
mother's permission, the police installed two surveillance cameras in the home,
one in the bedroom and the other in the living room. Shortly after midnight
on September 13, father called the police to report Cesar was present in the
home and asked that a patrol unit visit the home because he was concerned S.V.
was being molested. The police reviewed
the tape the next day and found Cesar was not present in the home between the
evening hours of September 12 and the morning of September 13 as father had
claimed. Only mother, S.V. and her
little brother were there, asleep in bed.


Father took the
children to the police station on September
14, 2009. The police
interviewed S.V. again and recorded this interview. S.V. had just turned six years old. She said that two days before, Cesar had
dinner at her mother's house. She was
awakened by a noise that night, got up, and saw her mother in the living room
with Cesar on top of her. S.V. admitted
to lying about some of the things she had told the police about Cesar. She said she had told her father she had lied
about some of the things Cesar did. The
police tried to confront S.V. with her inconsistent statements, but she became
upset and complained her stomach hurt.
The police then recorded another interview of father and telephonically
interviewed the paternal grandmother. At
the end of their investigation, including the review of the tapes proving Cesar
was not in mother's home on the night S.V. reported she saw him on top of her
mother, the police arrested father for making a false police report and referred
the children to the Department.

The Department
detained the children and placed them in foster care. A dependency investigator interviewed S.V. in
person in late October 2009. S.V. had
only a vague memory of meeting Cesar once, and said she did not know the
difference between a â€