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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowAn aunt who repeatedly sought to gain custody of her 4-year-old niece the Department of Child Services placed in foster care got no relief from the Indiana Court of Appeals Wednesday.
M.B. was born in 2011 to Shalena Barnes and putative father Stephen West. She was adjudicated a child in need of services in 2014, and the Department of Child Services placed her in foster care with the goal of reunification with her mother.
West’s sister, Stephanie Choate, and her husband, Dustin Choate, sought to intervene in the CHINS case to have M.B. placed with them. The Choates argued they had provided primary support and care for M.B. since birth, that West was unable to care for the child, and Barnes was incarcerated.
The Posey Circuit CHINS court denied the Choates’ motion to intervene, which they did not appeal. Less than a month later, they filed the instant independent action seeking emergency custody of M.B. The trial court dismissed the action, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. The COA noted that the Posey CHINS and trial court were one in the same.
“Custody of M.B. has already been determined by the CHINS court and has been granted to DCS. In other circumstances, the Choates’ remedy if they wished to take custody of M.B. would be to seek modification of that custody determination through the CHINS case. However, in this particular case, they have already tried to do so and their petition to intervene was denied. They did not appeal that denial but instead initiated this action,” Judge Margret Robb wrote for the panel.
“Because none of the exceptions to the juvenile court’s exclusive jurisdiction over the custody of M.B. apply to this case, however, the trial court had no jurisdiction over the Choates’ independent custody action,” the panel held.
Robb expanded on this in a footnote: “To be clear, no trial court would have jurisdiction to entertain this independent custody action. Even if the Choates had been successful in obtaining a change of judge or had originally filed elsewhere, the result would be the same.”
The case is In re the Custody of: M.B. b/n/f Stephanie Choate and Dustin Choate v. Shalena Barnes and Stephen West, 65A04-1412-MI-607.
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