Child Law

Respondent appealed from a circuit court order adjudicating respondent’s minor child as a ward of the court, and challenged the court's finding of neglect. The appellate court affirmed and the supreme court granted respondent’s petition for leave to appeal. The supreme court also affirmed, finding that the appeal was moot because respondent only challenged the neglect finding and failed to also challenge the dependency finding. The supreme court also overruled all appellate court cases that restricted appeals to a single issue where a circuit court makes more than one finding that a minor is abused, neglected, or dependent. (THEIS, OVERSTREET, HOLDER WHITE, CUNNINGHAM, ROCHFORD, and O’BRIEN, concurring)

Respondent appealed from the circuit court’s termination of his parental rights over two of his children following an unfitness hearing and a best interest hearing. On appeal, respondent argued that the court erroneously found him unfit because reunification services were not available to him while he was incarcerated and that the trial court erred in its best interest determination because it incorrectly found him unfit. The appellate court affirmed, explaining that the trial court’s finding that respondent was unfit was not against the manifest weight of the evidence where the record established that respondent’s actions and inactions indicated a complete lack of intent to pursue services needed to reunite him with his children and that this pattern of inaction began before respondent was incarcerated and continued after his incarceration. (McBRIDE and HOWSE, concurring)

Respondent appealed from the trial court’s refusal to hear her motion for unsupervised visitation with her minor son on the grounds that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to consider that question during the pendency of respondent’s appeal from the trial court’s prior adjudicatory findings. The appellate court granted respondent’s petition for leave to appeal the refusal and concurrently revested the trial court with limited jurisdiction to hear the motion, which it then considered and granted. This rendered the pending appeal moot, but respondent urged the court to nonetheless consider the question of the trial court’s continuing jurisdiction in child protection cases under the public interest exception to the mootness doctrine. The appellate court did so and agreed with the respondent that not only does the trial court have continuing jurisdiction in child protection cases but the duty, during the pendency of an appeal, to exercise its jurisdiction. (ODEN JOHNSON and MITCHELL, concurring)

Respondent appealed from a circuit court judgment terminating her parental rights to her two minor children. On appeal, respondent raised several issues related to the summons, the discharge of her appointed counsel, the absence of a notice of default order, the judicial notice of a court docket, and the denial of her motion to vacate. The appellate court reversed and remanded, finding that respondent was denied due process when the circuit court discharged her counsel without compliance with SCR 13 and then proceeded to hold a hearing on the petitions to terminate her parental rights without respondent or her counsel being present at the hearing. (STEIGMANN and LANNERD, concurring)