Adoption of Don

Summary

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed adjudications that five children were in need of care and protection, commitments to the Department of Social Services, and decrees dispensing with the parents’ consent to adoption. The court held that the evidence supported current parental unfitness, that the Massachusetts constitutional right to face-to-face confrontation does not apply in civil child-custody and parental-rights proceedings, and that the seating arrangements for child witnesses did not violate due process. The court also rejected the parents’ claim that the duration of the proceedings caused prejudicial constitutional delay and affirmed the denial of stays pending appeal.

Holdings

1. A finding of current parental unfitness may rely on prior patterns of neglect or misconduct when those patterns have prognostic value and are not rebutted by more recent evidence demonstrating parental capacity. The trial judge did not clearly err in finding the parents currently unfit.
2. The article 12 right to confront witnesses face to face, as applied in criminal cases, does not apply to civil care and protection or termination-of-parental-rights proceedings.
3. The trial judge's instruction that the parents sit in the back row while the children testified did not violate due process because the parents remained present, could choose their position in the row, were represented by counsel, and had the opportunity to cross-examine the witnesses and present opposing evidence.
4. The lengthy proceedings did not violate due process because the parents failed to show that the delay prejudiced them or that the outcome would have been different had the proceedings concluded sooner.
5. The Appeals Court single justice properly denied the parents' motions to stay the decrees dispensing with parental consent to adoption.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the Juvenile Court improperly relied on stale evidence rather than more recent evidence in finding the parents currently unfit to care for their children.
2. Whether article 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights gives parents in a civil care and protection or termination-of-parental-rights proceeding a right to face-to-face confrontation with child witnesses.
3. Whether the trial judge's seating arrangement, which allowed the parents to view the child witnesses only from the rear and in profile, violated due process.
4. Whether the nearly five-year duration of the care and protection proceedings violated the parents' due process rights.
5. Whether the Appeals Court single justice properly denied the parents' motions to stay the adoption-consent decrees pending appeal.

Disposition

affirmed