Child’s best interests; Relative placement consideration; In re Olive/Metts; In re Atchley; In re Gentry

Concluding that the trial court did not clearly err in finding on remand that termination was in the child’s best interests, the court affirmed the order terminating respondent-father’s parental rights. It previously vacated the trial court’s best-interest ruling because it had failed to acknowledge the child’s relative placement, much less that it weighed against termination. It remanded with the directive to fully address the best-interest factors in making the decision, and retained jurisdiction. “On remand, the trial court specifically acknowledged” the relative placement in making its best-interests decision, and found that, given the time the child “had been with his aunt; the permanence, stability, and finality of that placement; and” the child’s desire to stay there as a permanent home, termination was in his best interests. After reviewing the entire record, the court found no clear error in this decision. The trial court stated: “Even though the child was in a relative placement, that relative placement actually is also serving as the prospective adoptive family.” The court noted that the trial court did not have to “make elaborate factual findings or explain itself at length. Instead, a short and plain explanation that acknowledged the fact of a relative placement and that such placement generally weighed against termination was sufficient. The fact that [it] made this acknowledgement implicitly by way of contradistinction in the same sentence that it recognized explicitly an aspect of that placement that strongly weighed in favor of termination does not somehow undermine its reasoning.” The court concluded that the trial court followed its directive on remand.