Summary 2012 WY 132

Summary of Decision October 12, 2012

Justice Burke delivered the opinion for the Court. Affirmed.

Case Name: IN THE MATTER OF THE ADOPTION OF AMP, a minor child. DLH v. JLA and JJA

Docket Number: S-12-0093

URL: http://www.courts.state.wy.us/Opinions.aspx

Appeal from the District Court of Goshen County, Honorable Keith G. Kautz, Judge.

Representing Appellant: John R. Hursh, Central Wyoming Law Associates, P.C., Laramie, Wyoming.

Representing Appellee: James A. Eddington, Jones & Eddington Law Offices, Torrington, Wyoming.

Date of Decision: October 12, 2012

Facts: Appellant, DLH, challenged the district court’s order granting the adoption of his four-year-old son, AMP, without Appellant’s consent.
Issues: The parties raise the following issue:

Whether the district court abused its discretion in granting JJA’s adoption of AMP without Appellant’s consent pursuant to Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv), due to Appellant’s willful failure to pay child support for a period of one year prior to the filing of the adoption petition, and his failure to bring his child support obligation current within 60 days after service of the petition.

Holdings: The district court’s conclusion that Appellant willfully failed to contribute to the support of his child is supported by the evidence. The evidence also supports the district court’s conclusion that Appellant failed to bring his child support obligation current within 60 days. Because it is undisputed that Appellant did not pay his accumulated arrearages, the Court cannot find that the district court abused its discretion in determining that this element of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 1-22-110(a)(iv) was satisfied. Affirmed.

Summaries are prepared by Law Librarians and are not official statements of the Wyoming Supreme Court

[SPECIAL NOTE: This opinion uses the "Universal Citation." It was given an "official" citation when it was issued. You should use this citation whenever you cite the opinion, with a P.3d parallel citation. You will also note when you look at the opinion that all of the paragraphs are numbered. When you need to provide a pinpoint citation to a quote the universal portion of the citation will use that paragraph number. The pinpoint citation in the P.3d portion will need to have the reporter page number. If you need assistance in putting together a citation from this, or any future opinion using the Universal Citation form, please contact the Wyoming State Law Library and we will provide any needed assistance]

Summary 2011 WY 78

Summary of Decision May 5, 2011

[SPECIAL NOTE: This opinion uses the "Universal Citation." It was given an "official" citation when it is issued. You should use this citation whenever you cite the opinion, with a P.3d parallel citation. You will also note when you look at the opinion that all of the paragraphs are numbered. When you need to provide a pinpoint citation to a quote the universal portion of the citation will use that paragraph number. The pinpoint citation in the P.3d portion will need to have the reporter page number. If you need assistance in putting together a citation from this, or any future opinion using the Universal Citation form, please contact the Wyoming State Law Library and we will provide any needed assistance]

Summaries are prepared by Law Librarians and are not official statements of the Wyoming Supreme Court

Case Name: IN THE MATTER OF THE ADOPTION OF RMS, Minor child: EOS, v. JLS and RS

Citation: 2011 WY 60

Docket Number: S 10 0209

URL: http://wyomcases.courts.state.wy.us/applications/oscn/DeliverDocument.asp?CiteID=462136

Appeal from the District Court of Natrona County, Honorable Scott W. Skavdahl, Judge

Representing Appellant (Plaintiff/Defendant): Tamara K. Schroeder of Chapman Valdez, Casper, Wyoming.

Representing Appellee (Plaintiff/Defendant): Stacy E. Casper of Casper Law Office, LLC, Casper, Wyoming.

Date of Decision: May 5, 2011

Facts: EOS, biological mother (Mother), appeals from the order allowing JLS’s and RS’s (Father and Stepmother) petition to adopt minor child, RMS, to proceed without Mother’s consent because she did not pay child support for a year before the petition was filed. Appellant claims there was insufficient proof that her failure to pay child support was willful.

Issues: Whether the District Court abused its discretion by allowing the petition for adoption to proceed without the consent of the Appellant. Whether the evidence was insufficient to support a finding that the Appellant had willfully failed to pay child support.

Holdings: A district court’s determination that a parent’s consent for an adoption is not required effectively terminates that parent’s parental rights. The right to associate with one’s family is fundamental; consequently, courts strictly scrutinize petitions to terminate a parent’s rights to his or her children. The petitioners have the obligation to establish by clear and convincing evidence that termination and adoption is appropriate. Mother claims that her failure to pay child support was not willful because she was unemployed and did not have the ability to pay.

In the instant case, the evidence established that Mother worked at a daycare until shortly after the child support order was entered, at which time she voluntarily ended her employment, and hence voluntarily terminated her means of providing support. Although she testified that she applied for jobs after that, without success, she did not take other steps to improve her prospects of becoming employed such as registering with an employment service or finishing the GED program to enhance her education. In addition, when Mother secured a job babysitting for her cousin and was paid for those efforts, she did not pay any of that money toward her child support obligation, despite the fact that her parents were paying for her living expenses. Although she testified that she did not voluntarily remain unemployed to avoid her child support obligation, the district court weighed the evidence and concluded she acted willfully.

The district court’s conclusion that Mother acted “intentionally, knowingly, purposely, voluntarily, consciously, deliberately, and without justifiable excuse, as distinguished from carelessly, inadvertently, accidentally, negligently, heedlessly or thoughtlessly’” when she did not pay child support was supported by the evidence. Contrary to her assertion, the record does not establish that she was being punished simply for being poor and uneducated. The evidence shows that Mother did not take the reasonable or logical steps necessary to become employed and support her child. In other words, she failed to demonstrate that, through whatever financial means were available to her; she had not forgotten her legal obligation to support her child. The district court did not abuse its discretion by concluding there was clear and convincing evidence that Mother willfully failed to support her child. Affirmed.

Chief Justice Kite delivered the opinion for the court.

Summary 2008 WY 50

Summary of Decision issued April 30, 2008

Summaries are prepared by Law Librarians and are not official statements of the Wyoming Supreme Court.

Case Name: In re CW and CW

Citation: 2008 WY 50

Docket Number: S-07-0157; S-07-0158

Appeal from the District Court of Uinta County, the Honorable Dennis L. Sanderson, Judge.

Representing Appellants (Petitioners): John A. Thomas, Evanston, Wyoming.

Representing Appellee (Respondent): Farrah L. Spencer, Harris Law Firm, PC, Evanston, Wyoming.

Guardian Ad Litem: Geoffrey James Phillips, Phillips Law, PC, Evanston, Wyoming.

Facts/Discussion: Mother and Father are the biological parents of CW1 and CW2. Mother and Father never married. In 2002, Mother married Husband. In these two consolidated appeals, Mother and Husband challenge the district court’s denial of their petition to adopt the two children and Mother challenges the district court’s denial of her petition to terminate Father’s parental rights.
Father had never been ordered to make any child support payments. The district court stated that because of the absence of a defined child support obligation and the duty of the court to strictly construe the statutes against terminating a non-consenting parent’s rights, the adoption could not be granted. The court also found it was impossible for Father to bring the child support current because it was impossible to state the amount of the obligation. Mother and Husband relied on In re Adoption of GAR. The legislature amended the statutes after GAR was decided in 1991 adding that an adoption may be granted over the objection of a parent if that parent has failed to bring the support obligation current within 60 days. In the instant case, Father asked the court to establish child support payments in his petition to establish paternity. The Court reaffirmed that every parent has a duty to contribute to the support of their child with or without a court order. Under the circumstances of the instant case, the Court would not disturb the ruling that Father had not willfully failed to make child support payments or to bring them current.
The Court noted that the statute provides that the adoption of a child may be ordered without the written consent of the parent. Even if the district court had concluded that one or more of the statutory factors had been met, it was still not required to order the adoption if it found other valid grounds for denying it. The district court’s decision letter showed that it carefully weighed the conflicting evidence about the best interests of the children in making their decision.
The Court has previously held that the adoption statutes control over the more general provisions found in the paternity statutes. Because the district court denied the adoption, its further decision to deny Mother’s petition to terminate Father’s parental rights worked no prejudice against Mother.

Holding: The Court would not disturb the ruling that Father had not willfully failed to make child support payments or to bring them current. Because the district court denied the adoption, its further decision to deny Mother’s petition to terminate Father’s parental rights worked no prejudice against Mother.

Affirmed.

J. Burke delivered the decision.

Link: http://tinyurl.com/648frk .

[SPECIAL NOTE: This opinion uses the "Universal Citation." It was given an "official" citation when it was issued. You should use this citation whenever you cite the opinion, with a P.3d parallel citation. Please note when you look at the opinion that all of the paragraphs are numbered. When you pinpoint cite to a quote, you should cite to this paragraph number rather than to any page number. If you need assistance in putting together a citation using the Universal Citation form, please contact the Wyoming State Law Library.]