IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA
No. 15-1548
Filed March 23, 2016
IN THE INTEREST OF Q.M. AND Q.M.,
Minor Children,
D.M., Mother,
Appellant.
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Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, Rachael E. Seymour,
District Associate Judge.
A mother appeals the termination of her parental rights to two of her
children. AFFIRMED.
Charles E. Isaacson, Des Moines, for appellant mother.
Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Kathrine S. Miller-Todd, Assistant
Attorney General, for appellee State.
Michael R. Sorci of the Youth Law Center, Des Moines, for minor children.
Considered by Vaitheswaran, P.J., and Doyle and Mullins, JJ.
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VAITHESWARAN, Presiding Judge.
A mother appeals the termination of her parental rights to two of her
children, born in 2008 and 2014. She contends the grounds for termination cited
by the district court were not established. We may affirm if we find clear and
convincing evidence to support any of those grounds. See In re S.R., 600
N.W.2d 63, 64 (Iowa Ct. App. 1999).
Our de novo review of the record reveals the following facts. The mother
has a history of unresolved marijuana abuse. In 2004, her parental rights to one
of her children were terminated based on her incarceration for four counts of
child endangerment. This followed on the heels of another termination order
involving her nine-month-old child whom she left alone in a car for twenty
minutes.
Ten years later, the younger of the two children who are the subject of this
proceeding was born with marijuana in her system. The department of human
services sought a temporary removal order, which was granted. The department
could not locate the mother and children, and she failed to appear for sentencing
on a pending third-degree theft charge. The district court issued a “runaway/pick
up order” authorizing law enforcement to seize the children wherever they may
be found for placement in a youth shelter. Three months after the removal order
was entered, the children’s whereabouts were still unknown.
Six months after the removal order was entered, the mother was arrested
on an outstanding warrant. She was brought to juvenile court and ordered to
disclose the children’s location. The mother told the court she took the children
to a relative in Texas. She identified the town where they were purportedly
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staying. Department personnel investigated her statement and discovered there
was no such town in Texas. The district court held the mother in contempt for
failing to disclose accurate information and ordered her to serve six months in
jail.
The children were eventually located without the mother’s assistance.
The district court ordered the mother’s release from jail after concluding “no
useful purpose” would be served by continuing to incarcerate her for contempt.
Meanwhile, the mother was placed on probation for theft.
The State petitioned to terminate the mother’s parental rights to these two
children. At the termination hearing, the mother denied having a substance
abuse problem while at the same time admitting almost twenty years of
marijuana use and no participation in substance abuse treatment. She
acknowledged her last usage of marijuana was less than two weeks before the
termination hearing.
Iowa Code section 232.116(1)(g) (2015) requires proof of several
elements including prior termination of parental rights to another child and a
parent’s continued inability or unwillingness “to respond to services which would
correct the situation.” The record contains clear and convincing evidence to
support this ground for termination. While the mother contends the district
court’s contempt order prevented her from complying with services and
remedying the problem, the court correctly noted she “was provided services
since 2003, and many of the same issues that were present at that time continue
to be present today.”
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We affirm the district court’s termination of the mother’s parental rights to
these two children.
AFFIRMED.