Background
D.B. is the mother of four children who were adjudicated children in need of care after periods in and out of Department of Children and Family Services custody. DCFS petitioned to terminate her parental rights, alleging chronic or extreme abuse or neglect under Louisiana Children’s Code article 1015(3)(i) and lack of substantial compliance with court-approved case plans under article 1015(5).
After trial, the juvenile court terminated D.B.’s parental rights and certified the children as free for adoption. D.B. appealed, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence, DCFS’s reunification efforts, the children’s best interests, and due process. The children supported her position concerning the oldest child, J.B., but otherwise sided with DCFS. The fathers did not appeal, so the termination of their parental rights remained final.
The Court’s Holding
The First Circuit vacated the termination of D.B.’s parental rights and remanded. Although the juvenile court took judicial notice of records from the underlying child-in-need-of-care proceedings, those records—including the case plans—were not introduced into evidence and were absent from the appellate record. The court held that it could not consider evidence outside the record and that testimony about multiple case plans for four children did not, without the plans themselves, establish by clear and convincing evidence the article 1015(5) ground for termination.
The court likewise concluded that the evidence properly in the record did not clearly and convincingly establish chronic abuse or neglect under article 1015(3)(i), because DCFS’s argument depended substantially on materials from the prior proceedings that were not in the appellate record. It remanded for the juvenile court to complete the record and, if necessary, permit DCFS to present required documentation and evidence. The children were ordered to remain in foster care with DCFS services and controlled, supervised visitation with D.B.; the court also stated that reunification was not presently in their best interests.
Chief Judge McClendon concurred in the remand but would have limited it solely to allowing the juvenile court to supplement the appellate record with records it had judicially noticed under Louisiana Children’s Code article 1036.1.
Key Takeaways
- Records from an underlying child-in-need-of-care proceeding must be properly introduced or otherwise made part of the appellate record before the court of appeal may rely on them.
- Without the actual court-approved case plans, DCFS did not prove by clear and convincing evidence that D.B. lacked substantial compliance under article 1015(5).
- Vacating the termination did not require immediate reunification and did not prevent DCFS from pursuing legally supported termination proceedings on remand.
Why It Matters
The decision underscores the evidentiary and record-building requirements governing termination of parental rights, one of the State’s most consequential interventions. Judicial notice by the juvenile court does not automatically supply an appellate court with records that were never introduced or included in the record on appeal.
The majority authorized a broader remand to correct the deficiencies and permit additional necessary evidence, while Chief Judge McClendon favored only supplementation with the records already judicially noticed.