RECORD IMPOUNDED
NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE
APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION
SUPERIOR COURT OF NEW JERSEY
APPELLATE DIVISION
DOCKET NO. A-2605-12T4
NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF
CHILDREN AND FAMILIES,
APPROVED FOR PUBLICATION
Petitioner-Respondent, June 9, 2014
v. APPELLATE DIVISION
R.R.,
Respondent-Appellant.
________________________________________
Submitted June 3, 2014 – Decided June 9, 2014
Before Judges Fisher, Koblitz and O'Connor.
On appeal from the New Jersey Department of
Children and Families, Docket No. AHU 11-
1411.
Mellk O'Neill, attorneys for appellant
(Arnold M. Mellk, of counsel; Gidian R.
Mellk and Edward A. Cridge, on the brief).
John J. Hoffman, Acting Attorney General,
attorney for respondent (Melissa H. Raksa,
Assistant Attorney General, of counsel;
Jennifer Hoff, Deputy Attorney General, on
the brief).
The opinion of the court was delivered by
O'CONNOR, J.S.C., (temporarily assigned).
On July 12, 2011, R.R., a school bus driver for the West
Windsor-Plainsboro Board of Education, failed to inspect the bus
at the conclusion of her route to determine if any children were
still on board. When R.R. exited the bus for the day, she left
behind five-year-old C.S., who was alone for almost an hour
before he was discovered. The Institutional Abuse Investigation
Unit (IAIU) of the Department of Children and Families (DCF)
substantiated that R.R. committed an act of neglect in violation
of N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.21(c)(4)(b). R.R. appealed the IAIU's
finding, which was ultimately affirmed by the DCF's Assistant
Commissioner of the Office of Performance Management and
Accountability (Commissioner). We affirm.
I
Following the IAIU finding that R.R. committed an act of
neglect, the Criminal History Review Unit of the Department of
Education (Department) suspended R.R.'s school bus "S"
endorsement on her driver's license for six months. R.R.
appealed both the IAIU finding of neglect and the Department's
decision to suspend the "S" endorsement on her driver's license
to the Office of Administrative Law.
The Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) who heard the appeal of
the decision to suspend the "S" endorsement found the following
facts. The route R.R. took on July 12, 2011 was not her usual
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one. She had, however, worked with the bus aide assigned to the
route in the past; in fact R.R. had previously complained to a
supervisor that the aide was inattentive, frequently making
cellular telephone calls and sending text messages while
children were on the bus. On the day of the incident, R.R.
noticed the aide sending text messages while the children were
being transported, and that she sat in the front instead of the
middle or back of the bus, where aides are required to sit to
better observe the children.
When R.R. reached C.S.'s home, she stopped the bus and
honked the horn. When an adult did not emerge, the aide told
R.R. that C.S. had not taken the bus that day. R.R. pulled away
and, after completing the route, returned to the bus parking lot
and dropped the aide off at her car. Before the aide got off
the bus, she reported that there were no children remaining.
Although R.R. also had an obligation to visually inspect the bus
at the end of a route to see if any children remained on board,
see N.J.S.A. 18A:39-28, she did not do so.
Within an hour of R.R. exiting the bus for the day, C.S.'s
mother contacted the school and reported that her son had not
arrived home. A staff person checked the bus and discovered
C.S. asleep in his seat, still buckled-in by a seat belt. The
child had been alone for a total of fifty-five minutes. R.R.
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admitted she did not check the vehicle before getting off,
explaining she had relied on the aide's representation that no
children remained on the bus after they reached the parking lot.
The ALJ affirmed the Department's decision to suspend the
"S" endorsement on R.R.'s license for six months, observing that
N.J.S.A. 18A:39-28 requires a school bus driver to visually
inspect the bus at the end of a transportation route to
determine if any pupils are still on board. The ALJ also noted
N.J.S.A. 18A:39-29 mandates a six month suspension of a school
bus driver's endorsement if a driver has left a pupil on a
school bus at the end of the driver's route. The ALJ concluded
that, apart from the fact R.R. had a statutory obligation to
make her own visual inspection of the bus at the end of her
route, her reliance on the aide's report that there were no
children left on board was unreasonable, given R.R.'s knowledge
the aide was inattentive both in the past and on the day of the
incident.
The ALJ filed her Initial Decision with the Acting
Commissioner of the Department, who adopted the court's
decision. R.R. did not appeal that decision.
Thereafter, another Administrative Law Judge heard the
appeal of the IAIU finding that R.R. had committed an act of
neglect under N.J.S.A. 9.6-8.21(c)(4)(b). The parties
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stipulated to the factual findings made by the first ALJ. The
parties also stipulated the highest temperature on the day of
the incident was ninety-five degrees. As no material facts were
in dispute, both R.R. and the DCF filed motions for summary
judgment. The second ALJ granted R.R.'s and denied the DCF's
motion for summary judgment, finding R.R. had not abused or
neglected C.S. as defined by N.J.S.A. 9.6-8.21(c)(4)(b), which,
he observed, requires a finding of "grossly or wantonly
negligent" and not merely negligent conduct.
Specifically, the second ALJ concluded it was reasonable
for R.R. to assume C.S. was not on the bus when no one emerged
from his home after she honked the horn, a conclusion that was
then reinforced when the aide commented the child had not taken
the bus that day. While R.R. harbored doubts about the aide's
attentiveness and reliability, the second ALJ opined it was
nonetheless reasonable for her to conclude the aide's
observations were accurate when in fact no adult met the child
at the stop.
The second ALJ dismissed the substantiation of neglect, and
filed his Initial Decision with the Commissioner. The
Commissioner rejected the second ALJ's recommendation and issued
a Final Decision affirming the substantiation of neglect, and
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ordered that R.R.'s name be placed on the Child Abuse Registry,
pursuant to N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.11.
The Commissioner found R.R. had engaged in wilful and
wanton conduct by failing to inspect the bus personally at the
end of the route, relying instead upon an untrustworthy,
unreliable aide's representation no children remained on board.
She further found R.R.'s assumption the child was not on the bus
because no one greeted him at his stop flawed, as R.R. was
unfamiliar with the route and unaware whether it was customary
for an adult to meet C.S. when he got off the bus. The
Commissioner also noted R.R. should have considered that the
child's caretaker may have been briefly detained inside of the
home, rather than assume the child was not on the bus.
II
Under N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.21(c)(4)(b), an "abused or neglected
child" means an individual under the age of eighteen years
whose physical, mental, or emotional
condition has been impaired or is in
imminent danger of becoming impaired as the
result of the failure of his parent or
guardian . . . to exercise a minimum degree
of care . . . (b) in providing the child
with proper supervision or guardianship, by
unreasonably inflicting or allowing to be
inflicted harm, or substantial risk
thereof[.]
Our Supreme Court has defined "minimum degree of care" as
"grossly or wantonly negligent" conduct. G.S. v. Dep't of Human
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Servs., 157 N.J. 161, 178 (1999). A parent or guardian "fails
to exercise a minimum degree of care when [the guardian] is
aware of the dangers inherent in a situation," but "fails
adequately to supervise the child or recklessly creates a risk
of serious injury to that child." Id. at 181. "Whether a
parent or guardian has failed to exercise a minimum degree of
care is to be analyzed in light of the dangers and risks
associated with the situation." Id. at 181-82. A parent or
guardian is held to what "an ordinary reasonable person would
understand" in considering whether a situation "poses dangerous
risks" and whether the guardian acted "without regard for the
potentially serious consequences." Id. at 179.
Actual harm need not befall a child for there to be a
violation of N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.21(c)(4)(b). See In re Guardianship
of D.M.H., 161 N.J. 365, 383 (1999); see also N.J. Dep't of
Children & Families v. A.L., 213 N.J. 1, 23 (2013); N.J. Div. of
Youth & Family Servs. v. V.T., 423 N.J. Super. 320, 330 (App.
Div. 2011). Abuse or neglect can occur when a child's
"physical, mental, or emotional condition . . . is in imminent
danger of becoming impaired as the result of the failure of his
parent or guardian . . . to exercise a minimum degree of care."
N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.21(c)(4)(b). "[An] abuse/neglect finding often
arises because of a legitimate and reasonable inference —
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stemming from the act or omission in question — that 'the child
is subject to future danger.'" Dep't of Children & Families v.
E.D.-O., 434 N.J. Super. 154, 159 n.5 (App. Div. 2014) (quoting
N.J. Div. of Youth & Family Servs. v. T.B., 207 N.J. 294, 307
(2011)). "[W]here a parent or guardian acts in a grossly
negligent or reckless manner, that deviation from the standard
of care may support an inference that the child is subject to
future danger." T.B., supra, 207 N.J. at 307.
We recently determined that a parent who left her nineteen-
month-old child unattended in a vehicle while the parent went
into a store 150 feet away failed to exercise the minimum degree
of care required by N.J.S.A. 9:6-8.21(c)(4)(b). E.D.-O., supra,
434 N.J. Super. at 160. Of concern was not only that the child
had been left alone but, "compounding the risks," had been left
alone in public and in a motor vehicle. Id. at 159-60. We
concluded a young child is exposed to "substantial peril" when
left alone in a vehicle out of a parent's sight, "no matter how
briefly." Id. at 161.
While the child in E.D.-O was younger than C.S. and the
engine was running, we do not discern any appreciable difference
between the extent of neglect that occurred in E.D.-O and here.
In both instances, a young, helpless child was left alone in a
vehicle parked in a lot to which the public had access. Here,
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there was the added element the temperature reached ninety-five
degrees on the day of the incident. Although fortuitously R.R.
had left the windows open on the bus before she left, given the
high temperatures the bus was very likely uncomfortably hot.
There is also the component that, in violation of a
statutory duty, R.R. had not even bothered to investigate
whether a child was still on the bus before she left for the
day. Her reliance upon the aide does not salvage her poor
judgment in light of R.R.'s knowledge the aide had been derelict
in her duties in the past, including on the day of the incident,
as evidenced by the aide's failure to properly position herself
on the bus where she could observe the students, and by her
preoccupation with sending text messages.
Appellate review of a final decision of a State
administrative agency is limited; we are obligated to "'defer to
an agency's expertise and superior knowledge of a particular
field.'" T.B., supra, 207 N.J. at 301-02 (citing Greenwood v.
State Police Training Ctr., 127 N.J. 500, 513 (1992)). "Thus,
we are bound to uphold an agency's decision 'unless there is a
clear showing that it is arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable,
or that it lacks fair support in the record.'" Ibid. (citing In
re Herrmann, 192 N.J. 19, 27-28 (2007)). We are satisfied the
Commissioner's conclusion R.R. violated N.J.S.A. 9:6-
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8.21(c)(4)(b) was not arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable; in
fact, her decision is amply supported by the record.
Affirmed.
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