Dependency Law Finder

Florida's dependency statutes, court rules and DCF operating procedures, with the appellate opinions that apply them

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V.L. v. Department of Children & Families201 So. 3d 1288 (Fla. 2d DCA 2016) · 2D16-1862

Court
2nd DCA
Decided
2016-10-28
Case
Dependency
Appellant
Father
County
Hillsborough

Reversed & remanded Dependency reversed because noncompliance with a case plan for older siblings, alone, did not show the child faced substantial risk of imminent harm.

Issue
Dependency adjudication: sufficiency of evidence
Law cited
§ 39.01(2), (15)(f), (30)(g) (now § 39.01(37)(g))

Summary, issues, facts, outcome, and appellant were extracted automatically from the opinion. Check the opinion itself before relying on them.

Court's PDF On CourtListener
PER CURIAM.

V.L., the father, appeals an order adjudicating his child N.L. dependent as to him. We reverse.

The Department of Children and Families and the Guardian ad Litem Program failed to present competent substantial evidence that N.L. was “at substantial risk of imminent abuse, abandonment, or neglect” by the father. See § 39.01(15)(f), Fla. Stat. (2015); see also § 39.01(2) (defining “abuse” as any willful act that results in any harm that causes or is likely to cause the child’s physical, mental, or emotional health to be significantly impaired); § 39.01(30)(g) (defining “harm” among other things as, exposing a child to chronic use of drugs “when the child is demonstrably adversely affected by such usage”).

Notably, the trial court’s order adjudicating N.L. dependent as to the father was based entirely on his failure to substantially comply with a case plan for his older children who were earlier adjudicated dependent. Neither the Department nor the Guardian Ad Litem Program has cited any case, and we-have not found one, to support the trial court’s sole reasoning that the father’s failure to comply with a case plan for his other children put N.L. at substantial risk of imminent abuse or neglect. Moreover, there is no evidence in the record establishing facts to show that N.L. was at substantial risk of imminent harm by the father’s failure to comply with the case plan for the two older children.

Accordingly, we reverse the order adjudicating N.L. dependent as to V.L. and remand for further proceedings.

Reversed and remanded.

KELLY, LaROSE, and LUCAS, JJ., Concur.

Opinion text: CourtListener, Free Law Project. Not an official reporter; check the court's version before citing.