SUMMARY: Grandparents no longer have a legal interest in court proceedings or a right to visitation once parents’ parental rights have been terminated, and could not intervene as foster or prospective adoptive parents as a matter of right.
The children, Carlos, Carlynn and Joshowah, were removed from the mother’s home in March 2006. A termination of parental rights petition was filed in May 2007. The grandparents filed a motion to intervene, which was granted on September 4, 2007. At the same hearing, the mother relinquished her parental rights. The children were placed in the grandparents’ home in November 2007. In September or October 2008, the grandparents began reporting behavioral issues with Joshowah and requested he be placed in a residential facility. In December 2008, the grandparents filed a motion alleging that DHHS would not let them visit Joshowah. A hearing on the motion was held on December 17, 2008, and after an in-chambers conference with attorneys and hearing the court found that the grandparents were no longer entitled to intervene. The grandparents appealed.
The Court of Appeals affirmed the juvenile court’s order. Once parental rights have been terminated, grandparents no longer have the right to intervene as the relationship between grandparent and grandchild is also terminated. Nor do the grandparents have an automatic right to intervene as the children’s foster parents or potential adoptive parents as 43-1314 only provides foster parents with notice and an opportunity to be heard. Because the grandparents are not entitled to visitation with Joshowah as a matter of right, the court did not err in limiting visitation.