In re Child of Lacy H.

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the judgment of the district court terminating Mother's parental rights to her child, holding that the district court did not err or abuse its discretion in determining that Mother was unfit and that the termination of her parental rights was in the child's best interest.On appeal, Mother argued, among other things, that the intervention of the Governor's office in the decision of the Department of Health and Human Services to cancel or delay her trial placement violated her equal protection and due process rights. The Supreme Judicial Court disagreed, holding (1) the court did not commit obvious error or any error of fact or law, whether constitutional or statutory in dimension, when it entered its judgment seven months after the Department's decision on the trial placement; (2) the court did not err in finding that Mother was unable to protect the child from jeopardy and those circumstances were unlikely to change within a time reasonably calculated to meet the child's needs; and (3) the court did not abuse its discretion in determining that the termination of Mother's parental rights was in the best interest of the child. View "In re Child of Lacy H." on Justia Law