Justia Family Law Opinion Summaries

The district court terminated Father’s parental rights with respect to his child, making the child legally available for adoption by her stepfather. Father appealed the termination order. The court of appeals certified the case for transfer to the Supreme Court. At issue before the Supreme Court were Father’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel and claims to the right to counsel under the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment and under the due process clause of the Utah Constitution. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that Father had a federal due process right to counsel in the district court proceedings and that that right was erroneously denied in violation of Father’s federal due process rights. View "In re K.A.S." on Justia Law

Mother’s parental rights to her daughter were terminated. During the termination proceedings at the juvenile court, Mother was unrepresented by counsel. At the end of the proceeding, the juvenile court found by clear and convincing evidence that Mother was unfit as a parent and that it was in the best interests of the child to be placed with Adoptive Parents. Mother appealed, challenging on multiple constitutional grounds Utah Code 78A-6-1111(2), the statutory scheme that provides appointed counsel for indigent parents in state-initiated parental termination proceedings while denying such counsel for indigent parents in privately initiated proceedings. The Supreme Court reversed in part, holding (1) section 78A-6-1111(2) is not facially unconstitutional; but (2) the court erred in relying on the statute to deny Mother’s request for counsel without considering Mother’s circumstances and due process rights. View "In re E.K.S." on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed an action seeking to establish his paternity in and custody over a child he believed to be his son (Child). Both Plaintiff and Mother were residents of Colorado. Mother travelled to Utah two days before Child’s birth and gave birth to Child in Utah. Mother then relinquished Child to a Utah-based adoption agency. For reasons unrelated to this appeal, the district court dismissed the case, but the Supreme Court reversed and remanded. After remand, Adoptive Couple intervened in Plaintiff’s action to request that his suit be dismissed, arguing that the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction under the Utah Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA). The district court granted the motion to dismiss, concluding that Utah was not Child’s home state for purposes of the UCCJEA. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not err by dismissing Plaintiff’s case on the basis that it lacked jurisdiction under the UCCJEA. View "Nevares v. Adoptive Couple" on Justia Law

A 14-year-old student at Juan Diego Catholic High School suffered serious and life-threatening injuries while using a lift to replace light bulbs in the auditorium, during his drama class. The lift tipped over as students pushed it from one light fixture to another, causing him to suffer life-threatening injuries, including traumatic brain injury. His parents filed a lawsuit, individually and as parents and guardians of the student, claiming negligence and vicarious liability, and seeking to bring a personal claim for loss of filial consortium. The district court dismissed the loss of filial consortium claim and certified the dismissal as final. The Utah Supreme Court vacated, adopting a cause of action for loss of filial consortium to allow parents to recover for loss of filial consortium due to tortious injury to a minor child in cases where the injury meets the definition set forth in Utah Code section 30-2-11, the spousal consortium statute. The court concluded that such a cause of action is not legislatively preempted. View "Benda v. Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City" on Justia Law

Before the child of Mother and Father was born, a process server personally delivered a prebirth notice (“the Notice”) to Father informing him that Mother intended to place Child up for adoption. The Notice advised Father that he may lose all rights relating to Child if he did not take certain steps within thirty days. Forty-two days after he received the Notice, Father filed a paternity action and affidavit with the district court. Adoptive Parents subsequently petitioned to adopt Child. Mother then gave birth to Child, and Mother and Father executed and filed a voluntary declaration of paternity naming Father as Child’s father. The next day, Mother relinquished her parental rights and surrendered Child to Adoptive Parents. Father filed a motion to intervene in Child’s adoption proceeding. The district court denied the motion on the grounds that Father did not meet the requirements of the Prebirth Notice Statute by pursuing his rights within the Statute’s thirty-day time period. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that because the Notice did not contain all of the information the Statute requires, Father’s failure to comply within the thirty-day time frame did not deprive him of his ability to contest Child’s adoption. View "In re Baby Q." on Justia Law

K.C., a minor child, was removed from the custody of her mother. Nearly seventeen months after K.C. had originally been removed from Mother’s custody and after a permanency hearing, the juvenile court terminated reunification services. The State then filed a petition for termination of parental rights. Mother argued that Department of Child and Family Services had not complied with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and that, therefore, the State was incapable of making “reasonable efforts” toward reunification. The juvenile court determined that the ADA is not a defense in a termination proceeding and, even if the ADA applied, Mother had not suffered from any failure to comply with the ADA because Mother’s disabilities were accommodated. The court then terminated Mother’s parental rights. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the ADA applies to the provision of reunification services under Utah Code 78A-6-312 and 78A-6-507; but (2) the juvenile court judge did not abuse his discretion in deciding that Mother’s requested modifications to the reunification plan in question were not reasonable. View "In re K.C." on Justia Law

The State filed a juvenile court petition seeking an adjudication that Appellant had abused and neglected his three children. Near the end of the sixty-day statutory deadline for a hearing on the State’s petition, all parties stipulated to waiver of the deadline and to an extension of the trial date to allow Appellant additional time for expert discovery and trial preparation. Despite the parties’ prior stipulation to waive the sixty-day statutory deadline for a hearing, the juvenile court denied Appellant’s formal request for additional time on the ground that the governing statute required a final adjudication hearing within sixty days of the filing of the petition. The juvenile court subsequently entered an order adjudicating Appellant’s children abused and neglected and prohibited any further contact between Appellant and his children. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) because the parties had jointly stipulated for an extension of the sixty-day statutory deadline, Appellant’s request for additional time should not have been denied; and (2) instead, the juvenile court should have exercised its discretion to decide whether further discovery was justified under the circumstances of this case. View "In re M.H." on Justia Law

Mark Johnson and Elizabeth Johnson married in 1974 and divorced a decade later. Mark retired in 1999. In 2008, Elizabeth filed a qualified domestic relations order attempting to secure her portion of Mark’s retirement benefit. To comply with the 1984 divorce decree the district court awarded Elizabeth ongoing payments from the date Elizabeth filed for the clarifying order. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part, holding that the court of appeals (1) did not err in determining that an action to enforce the ongoing right to collect a portion of pension retirement benefits is not barred by the statute of limitations; (2) did not err in determining that Mark’s argument concerning laches was inadequately briefed; and (3) erred when it affirmed the district court’s award granting Elizabeth her marital fraction of Mark’s actual retirement benefits. Remanded. View "Johnson v. Johnson" on Justia Law

Robert Baird sought a civil stalking injunction against his mother, Gloria Baird, because Gloria contacted him almost every day. The district court granted a three-year injunction, determining that Gloria’s nearly daily phone calls to Robert were causing Robert emotional distress. Gloria appealed, arguing that the district court misinterpreted Utah’s Stalking Statute because it entered the injunction based on its finding that Gloria’s conduct was causing Robert emotional distress without finding that her conduct would have caused emotional distress to a reasonable person in Robert’s circumstances. The Supreme Court vacated the stalking injunction, holding (1) the Stalking Statute required the district court to determine whether Gloria’s conduct would cause a reasonable person in Robert’s circumstances emotional distress; and (2) the statutory definition of emotional distress means mental or psychological suffering, and there is no requirement that the emotional distress arise from outrageous and intolerable conduct by the respondent. View "Baird v. Baird" on Justia Law

Christopher Carlton, a Pennsylvania resident, was in a relationship with Shalanda Brown, who was pregnant with Carlton’s child. Unbeknownst to Carlton, Brown traveled to Utah, where she gave birth to a baby girl and relinquished her parental rights to Adoption Center of Choice, Inc. Because no putative father was registered with respect to the child, Adoption Center commenced and adoption proceedings for the child, which were later finalized. Brown, however, had informed Carlton that the child had died. After Brown subsequently told Carlton that the baby was still alive and had been given up for adoption, Carlton filed an amended petition to establish paternity challenging the constitutionality of the Utah Adoption Act and the extent of the rights it affords to putative fathers who wish to contest adoptions in Utah. The district court dismissed Carlton’s petition based on a lack of standing. The Supreme Court reversed in part, holding that the district court erred in (1) denying Carlton leave to amend his petition to cure standing defects to assert the constitutional claims, and thereby, in dismissing Carlton's constitutional claims; and (2) dismissing Carlton’s claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Remanded. View "Carlton v. Brown" on Justia Law