In re V.L. CA3

Filed 10/28/26 In re V.L. CA3 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT (Tehama) In re V.L., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court C105712 Law. (Super. Ct. No. 24JU-000052) TEHAMA COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SERVICES, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. A.G., Defendant and Appellant. A.G. (father) appeals from the juvenile court’s orders denying his petition to modify under Welfare and Institutions Code section 388 1 and terminating his parental rights to the minor V.L. under section 366.26. Father contends (1) he met his burden under section 388, and (2) the juvenile court failed to follow applicable law in terminating parental rights. We will affirm. 1 Undesignated statutory references are to the Welfare and Institutions Code. 1  BACKGROUND Father is the biological and presumed father of V.L. (the minor). J.L. (mother) is the minor’s mother. Mother is not a party to this appeal. On June 3, 2024, the Tehama County Department of Social Services (Department) filed a petition alleging V.L. came within the provisions of section 300. The petition alleged the minor had suffered, or there was a substantial risk that the minor would suffer, serious physical harm or illness as a result of mother’s failure or inability of mother to supervise or protect the minor. Specifically, the petition alleged mother and the minor tested positive for fentanyl and amphetamine after the minor’s birth. Mother received no prenatal care and had no provisions at home. The minor’s six-year-old half- sibling C.W. is not subject to this appeal. When interviewed by the Department, C.W. said mother had paper with white powder in her closet, and she told him not to touch it. C.W. also said that mother would leave him home alone for days at times, he was unable to call for help, and did not feel safe. At the June 4, 2024 detention hearing, the juvenile court found the continuance of the minor in mother’s home was contrary to the minor’s welfare, ordered the minor detained in foster care, and continued the matter for a joint dispositional and jurisdictional hearing. The court sustained the allegations of the section 300 petition at the July 16, 2024 hearing and continued the matter for six-month review and to determine disposition. The court stated it anticipated the minor’s placement with the maternal grandparents. On August 6, 2024, the juvenile court found father to be the presumed father of the minor. On August 15, 2024, the Department filed a letter in the juvenile court recommending reunification services for father to address anger management, parenting, and alcohol use. The Department raised the concerns because father tested positive for alcohol at the Department and he had multiple driving under the influence convictions, a 2 2007 deferred charge for battery of a cohabitant (Pen. Code, § 243, subd. (e), and a 2020 conviction for fighting in a public place (Pen. Code, § 415, subd. (1)). The Department also submitted a case plan that included the following reunification services: completion of a 32-week anger management program, parenting education, individual therapy, a drug and alcohol assessment, and substance drug testing. The court set a hearing for September 4, 2024. On September 3, 2024, father filed a section 388 petition asking the juvenile court to grant him custody of the minor after termination of jurisdiction. The court denied his request the next day. On September 5, 2024, father filed a second section 388 petition seeking the same relief. Father claimed he had not tested positive for any drugs and “there [was] nothing to suggest he should not have custody of the [minor]. On September 16, 2024, the Department responded that father had acted suspiciously during three urinalysis screenings after filing his request. Specifically, father provided samples that did not have “bubbles and foam” like the majority of the urine samples collected by the Department, the social workers observing the test did not hear sounds that indicated father urinated, his urine sample smelled foul, and on one occasion he used a plastic phallic urine device to attempt to complete the urinalysis. The Department recommended the court order reunification services for father. The juvenile court heard and denied father’s section 388 petition on October 15, 2024, finding no change in circumstances. On September 18, 2024, the juvenile court filed its findings and order after jurisdictional and dispositional hearings. The court found the minor’s placement with the maternal grandparents was appropriate and ordered reunification services for father. On December 6, 2024, the Department filed a six-month review report that recommended continuation of reunification services for father. Father was participating in the anger management program, was nearly finished with his parenting course, and 3 was regularly visiting with the minor. The report noted father’s three previous urinalysis incidents and disclosed the results of a substance abuse assessment, which concluded that father did not meet criteria for services. Father later tested positive for methamphetamine and amphetamine, received a second substance abuse assessment, and enrolled in an outpatient group. The Department asserted that father was in “marginal compliance” with his case plan. On January 7, 2025, the juvenile court held a contested six-month review hearing. Father tested positive for methamphetamine the previous day. The court ordered additional reunification services, increased father’s visitation time and length, admonished father he must regularly submit to urinalysis testing, and set a 12-month review hearing. On May 23, 2025, the Department filed a 12-month status review report. The report recommended the court terminate reunification services for father and set a section 366.26 hearing. Father was partially in compliance with his case plan. He did not attend a required child and family team meeting, he was participating in and engaged with the anger management program, and he completed his parenting education services. He was not in compliance with drug testing, but was in compliance with his outpatient drug treatment. The report noted that father claimed he was stressed out by the classes, which caused him to start drinking again and he did not understand why he was required to participate in services because he was the non-offending parent. Father also had consistent and appropriate visits with the minor, but the Department asserted that visits could not increase or transition to being unsupervised because he was not compliant with his drug testing. On June 3, 2025, the Department filed a letter in the juvenile court. The letter indicated father completed his parenting, anger management, and domestic violence courses, he continued to visit the minor regularly, and he was engaged at a child and family team meeting. The letter also disclosed that father had not shown up 4 for his scheduled urinalysis tests, which resulted in three additional presumptive positive tests. On June 24, 2025, the juvenile court held a contested 12-month review hearing. The court indicated father loved the minor, had positive interactions with her, and was involved in most of his programs. The court also stated father’s “main issue(s)” were participating in drug testing and “lack of accepting responsibility or acknowledging the problem.” The court ordered that reunification services for father be continued and directed father to submit to a urinalysis test that day. The court advised father that if he tested negative then visits would become unsupervised and extended, however, it also admonished father that if he tested positive the Department would file a section 388 petition to modify visitation. The court ordered father to continue to submit to uranalysis testing and comply with all substance abuse treatment services. On August 27, 2025, the Department filed a letter in the juvenile court that indicated father failed two urinalysis tests and failed to appear at five others. The letter recommended that the court terminate services and set a section 366.26 hearing. On the same day, the Department filed a section 388 petition seeking to terminate Father’s reunification services and reduce visitation with the minor because father could not remain sober and family visitation had not progressed. On September 11, 2025, the Department filed another letter in the court indicating that father had tested positive for methamphetamine, amphetamine, and ecstasy on August 27, 2025; he appeared for a urinalysis on September 5, 2025 but refused to pull up his shirt or pull down his pants after the observer noticed his bunched and layered underwear, resulting in a cancelled visit; and he tested positive for methamphetamine and amphetamine on September 8, 2025, which also resulted in a cancelled visit. 5  On October 6, 2025, the Department filed a letter updating the court on father’s drug testing progress. The letter indicated that father tested positive for methamphetamine four times since September 11, 2025, and he sent a social worker an e-mail claiming negative tests from two other people were his. The letter recommended terminating reunification services. On October 15, 2025, the juvenile court heard and granted the Department’s section 388 petition to terminate services for father. The court found reasonable services were offered and father did not take advantage of them. On January 12, 2026, the Department filed a section 366.26 report, recommending termination of parental rights and adoption as the minor’s permanent plan. The report indicated that the current placement with the maternal grandmother was identified as a potential adoptive home for the minor and father had attended two visits since the hearing on October 15, 2025. On January 26, 2026, father filed a section 388 petition seeking placement of the minor with him under a family maintenance case plan. Father asserted his completion of a 60-day residential treatment program and transition to a sober living facility constituted a changed circumstance. The juvenile court set a joint section 388 and 366.26 hearing. On February 10, 2026, the juvenile court held a joint contested hearing on sections 366.26 and 388. After considering the Department’s section 366.26 report, father’s petition, father’s testimony, and argument from counsel, the juvenile court denied father’s section 388 petition. The court found there was not a substantial change of circumstances but merely the “beginning of a possibility of … changed circumstances.” Father was given the opportunity to test and receive treatment and was specifically admonished that reunification services would be terminated if he failed to test or tested positive for drugs. The court found that father was sincere about his desire to recover and not relapse, but also found that father was in the early stages of sobriety 6 and it was too soon to know if he was going to follow through on his relapse prevention plan. As to the section 366.26 hearing, the court found father’s bond with the minor was “slight” because he had not had a lot of contact with the minor, and the minor lived with her maternal grandmother since being removed from mother at birth. The court also concluded it was not in the minor’s best interests to remove her from her current living environment, father had not shown a sufficient bond to overcome the adoption preference, and adoption was in the best interests of the minor. The court terminated parental rights and ordered adoption as the minor’s permanent plan. DISCUSSION I Father contends he met his burden under section 388. We disagree. Section 388, subdivision (a) states in pertinent part: “Any parent or other person having an interest in a child who is a dependent child of the juvenile court ... may, upon grounds of change of circumstance or new evidence, petition the court in the same action in which the child was found to be a dependent child of the juvenile court ... for a hearing to change, modify, or set aside any order of court previously made or to terminate the jurisdiction of the court.” Subdivision (d) of section 388 states in pertinent part: “If it appears that the best interests of the child … may be promoted by the proposed change of order, ... the court shall order that a hearing be held.” A modification petition “is addressed to the sound discretion of the juvenile court and its decision will not be disturbed on appeal in the absence of a clear abuse of discretion.” (In re Jasmon O. (1994) 8 Cal.4th 398, 415.) “ ‘ “When two or more inferences can reasonably be deduced from the facts, the reviewing court has no authority to substitute its decision for that of the trial court.” ’ ” (In re Stephanie M. (1994) 7 Cal.4th 295, 319.) The question on appeal is “ ‘ “whether the trial court exceeded the bounds of reason.” ’ ” (Id. at pp. 318-319.) 7  Father did not meet his burden to show changed circumstances. At the section 388 hearing father had been sober for 108 days. As father agrees in his brief, “[i]t is the nature of the addiction that one must be ‘clean’ for a much longer period than 120 days to show real reform.” (In re Kimberly F. (1997) 56 Cal.App.4th 519, 531, fn. 9.) Father struggled to maintain sobriety by testing positive for drugs and alcohol on several occasions, cheating on urinalysis tests, and failing to show up for multiple urinalysis tests during the pendency of the case -- despite admonitions from the juvenile court. Father was also living in a sober living house that did not allow children and therefore family maintenance was not a realistic option at his stage of recovery. While commendable, father’s completion of drug treatment and placement in a sober living facility at this stage of the case was not a substantial change of circumstances. (In re Ernesto R. (2014) 230 Cal.App.4th 219, 223.) We find no error or abuse of discretion. Because father did not meet his burden to show changed circumstances, we need not address his argument that juvenile court erred in finding the proposed modification was not in the best interests of the minor. II In addition, father contends the juvenile court failed to follow applicable law in terminating parental rights. At the section 366.26 selection and implementation hearing, a juvenile court must choose one of the several “ ‘possible alternative permanent plans for a minor child. … The permanent plan preferred by the Legislature is adoption. [Citation.]’ [Citation.] If the court finds the child is adoptable, it must terminate parental rights absent circumstances under which it would be detrimental to the child.” (In re Ronell A. (1996) 44 Cal.App.4th 1352, 1368, italics omitted.) There are only limited circumstances that permit the court to find a “compelling reason for determining that termination [of parental rights] would be detrimental to the child.” (§ 366.26, subd. (c)(1)(B).) 8 One such circumstance is the so-called beneficial parental relationship exception. (§ 366.26, subd. (c)(1)(B)(i) [beneficial parental relationship exception]; In re Caden C. (2021) 11 Cal.5th 614, 629 (Caden C.).) The party claiming the exception has the burden of establishing the existence of any circumstances that constitute an exception to the termination of parental rights. (Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at pp. 636-637; In re Melvin A. (2000) 82 Cal.App.4th 1243, 1252; Cal. Rules of Court, rule 5.725(d)(2).) The parent “must show regular visitation and contact with the child, taking into account the extent of visitation permitted. Moreover, the parent must show that the child has a substantial, positive, emotional attachment to the parent — the kind of attachment implying that the child would benefit from continuing the relationship. And the parent must show that terminating that attachment would be detrimental to the child even when balanced against the countervailing benefit of a new, adoptive home.” (Caden C., at p. 636.) It appears the juvenile court conducted an analysis of the Caden C. factors and found father did not demonstrate a sufficient bond with the minor that would overcome the benefit of adoption and that adoption was in the best interests of the minor. The court further found that father did not have a lot of contact with the minor, despite having some positive visits; the minor had never been in her father’s custody; the minor was benefiting from care and stability of her maternal grandmother; the minor had been with grandmother since being removed at birth from mother; and the minor was placed with her half-sibling. It is not enough for a parent to show positive contact during visits. (In re C.F. (2011) 193 Cal.App.4th 549, 555.) Interaction between a natural parent and child will almost always confer some benefit to the child. (In re Autumn H. (1994) 27 Cal.App.4th 567, 575.) What the parent must establish is that a minor has such a significant, positive emotional attachment to the parent that the benefit of maintaining it outweighs the 9 benefits a minor would obtain from adoption. (Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at pp. 633- 634.) The record does not support such a conclusion. DISPOSITION The juvenile court’s orders are affirmed. /S/ MAURO, Acting P. J. We concur: /S/ BOULWARE EURIE, J. /S/ MESIWALA, J. 10