Background
T.R. (Father) and K.W. (Mother) are the parents of K.R. (born 2016) and Te.R. (born 2018); Mother is also the biological mother of Ko.W. (born 2014), of whom Father is not the biological parent. In July 2022, a firearm-discharge incident prompted the Indiana Department of Child Services (DCS) to file a CHINS petition based on domestic violence, parental substance abuse, and housing instability. The children were ultimately removed from Mother’s care — she voluntarily surrendered them to DCS within weeks of the adjudication — and placed together in foster care.
The two parents’ paths through the CHINS case diverged sharply. Mother had a history of disengagement: she repeatedly failed to maintain services, refused domestic violence treatment, declined random drug screens despite admitted marijuana use, and had not seen the children in over nine months by the time of the termination hearing. Father, by contrast, appeared late — he was initially served by publication and defaulted — but once engaged in August 2023 he was consistently compliant. He completed domestic violence assessment and treatment, home-based therapy, and Father Engagement services, held employment, and maintained a strong bond with the children through consistent supervised visitation.
Father’s sole obstacle to reunification was stable housing. His criminal history caused at least fifty apartment applications to be rejected. He lived with his sister-in-law, but her household had a prior DCS history that automatically disqualified it as a placement — even though DCS has a written policy allowing it to seek a waiver in precisely that situation; no waiver was ever sought. One week before the November 2025 termination hearing, Father found an apartment willing to rent to him despite his record. He needed $1,300 for the deposit, told his family case manager, and asked for help; DCS had a policy providing up to $750 for a one-time rent-and-deposit payment, but the case manager “hadn’t had a chance” to consult her supervisor about assistance before the hearing proceeded. DCS petitioned for termination in June 2025, and the Marion Superior Court entered TPR orders in December 2025 as to both parents.
The Court’s Holding
Affirmed as to Mother; reversed and remanded as to Father. Writing for a unanimous panel, Judge Brown applied different analyses to the two parents.
As to Mother, the court upheld the trial court’s finding that there is a reasonable probability the conditions causing removal will not be remedied. The record documented three years of inconsistent service engagement, repeated referral closures for noncompliance, failure to complete domestic violence treatment, refusal to participate in drug screening, emotional and aggressive behavior with service providers and at court hearings, and nine-plus months without visiting the children. The court also rejected Mother’s procedural due process claim, finding it waived because it was not raised at the fact-finding hearing and no fundamental error argument was advanced on appeal.
As to Father, the court found that DCS failed to make reasonable efforts to reunify him with his children, creating a due process violation under In re T.W., 135 N.E.3d 607 (Ind. Ct. App. 2019). Father had preserved the issue by raising it explicitly in closing argument at the termination hearing. The court identified three specific failures. First, DCS never sought a waiver under its own policy to allow the children to be placed in the sister-in-law’s home notwithstanding her DCS history — a tool that existed for exactly this purpose and was simply never used. Second, when Father identified an apartment and needed $1,300 for a deposit just one week before the termination hearing — demonstrating he was “on track to find traditional housing” DCS would approve — DCS took no steps to explore that option before proceeding to terminate his rights. Third, the court found it “curious” that DCS rejected Father’s extended-stay hotel as too unstable while the record showed DCS had found a similar arrangement adequate for Mother to maintain placement of the children at the outset of the same CHINS case. The court concluded that, under the unique circumstances of the case, DCS’s inaction — particularly its failure to deploy available tools — created a risk of erroneous termination incompatible with Father’s due process rights. The court reversed the termination of Father’s parental rights as to K.R. and Te.R. and remanded with instructions to reopen the CHINS case and re-examine the requirements for reunification.
Key Takeaways
- A father’s consistent compliance with every ordered service does not guarantee reunification, but it does significantly constrain DCS’s ability to terminate parental rights when the only remaining barrier is one DCS had its own tools to address. Where DCS has written policies — such as a placement-history waiver or a rent-and-deposit assistance payment — and fails to deploy them at the precise moment they are needed, that failure may constitute the kind of unreasonable inaction that violates a parent’s due process rights.
- Under In re T.W., due process in termination proceedings requires DCS to make genuine, not merely nominal, reunification efforts. When a compliant parent’s sole obstacle is one DCS can help remove, the obligation to do so intensifies rather than disappears as the case approaches the termination hearing.
- A parent’s due process claim in a termination proceeding is not waived if it is raised at the close of the fact-finding hearing. Counsel should make an express due-process argument in closing argument — as Father’s counsel did here — to preserve the issue for appeal. A mother’s nearly identical due-process claim was waived in this same case because it was raised only on appeal.
- DCS cannot apply an inconsistent housing standard — deeming an extended-stay hotel adequate for a mother to retain custody at the outset of a CHINS case but then using a father’s reliance on the same type of temporary housing as grounds for terminating his rights three years later. Inconsistency in how DCS applies housing standards is a factor courts will scrutinize when evaluating whether reasonable efforts were made.
Why It Matters
T.R. v. Indiana DCS is a significant reminder that Indiana’s termination-of-parental-rights statute is “intended as a last resort, available only when all other reasonable efforts have failed.” In re I.A., 934 N.E.2d 1127, 1136 (Ind. 2010). For family law practitioners representing parents in CHINS and TPR proceedings, the decision reinforces two practical lessons. First, document every request for services or assistance the parent makes, and document DCS’s response or non-response — this is the evidentiary record from which a T.W. due-process argument is built. Second, raise the due-process argument at the close of the fact-finding hearing; waiting until appeal is too late.
For DCS and its attorneys, the opinion signals that the agency’s own internal policies create standards against which its conduct will be measured. If DCS has a waiver process for placement homes with DCS history, and a policy allowing rent-and-deposit payments, failing to use those tools when a compliant parent needed them most will support a finding that DCS did not make reasonable efforts. The safest practice is to document and exhaust every available tool — especially near the termination petition stage — when a parent is otherwise meeting all requirements.