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Trumbull County court properly terminated mother’s parental rights
TRACEY BLAIR
Legal News Reporter
Published: November 9, 2016
The 11th District Court of Appeals recently affirmed a Trumbull County trial judge’s decision to terminate a mother’s parental rights over three of her children.
Rachel Wargo and her now-10-year-old son, J.H., appealed the court’s judgment granting the Trumbull County Children Services Board permanent custody of J.H., his step-sister, C.C., age 13, and his 8-year-old sister, M.H.
“This case has a long and sad history,” 11th District Judge Cynthia Westcott Rice wrote in her 2-1 opinion.
Rice noted that in 2007, Me.C, J.H.’s oldest stepsister, alleged Wargo’s boyfriend, Michael Hanick, had sexually abused her. However, due to a lack of physical evidence, the only finding was that the four children were dependent.
Case summary shows that in 2009, Wargo’s five children were returned to her and Hanick with the condition the mother get a home with at least three bedrooms. The family lived in a small and cluttered two-bedroom trailer in Vienna. There were no beds, dressers, blankets, or sheets for the children.
Legal custody was restored to the couple after they moved into a larger srental in McDonald.
In 2014, Me.C., then 14, told a guidance counselor that Hanick was sexually molesting her again. Me.C. was removed from the home via an ex parte temporary custody order.
Me.C. was found to be abused and remained in the agency’s custody. The other children (Mi.C., C.C., J.H. and M.H.) were declared dependent and allowed to remain with their mother under a protective supervision order.
However, the mother failed to comply with an order to keep Hanick out of the home.
After another daughter then claimed Hanick molested her, three of the children were placed in foster care in 2014. Two were ordered to remain in temporary custody of a grandparent.
Officers found the rental “in deplorable condition with so much clutter police could not get through the front door.”
Hanick was sentenced to 10 years to life after he admitted raping the girls.
In March 2015, the agency filed a motion for permanent custody of C.C., J.H. and M.H. C.C.’s father voluntarily surrendered parental rights of his three children. The other children’s father did not participate in the hearing.
At trial, the case worker testified Wargo did not believe her daughters’ rape allegations despite DNA evidence and Hanick’s own admissions of guilt.
Meanwhile, the mother never worked and never even tried to get a job. Watkins also admitted smoking marijuana every day and said she never plans on stopping. After Hanick went to prison, she moved back in with her abusive ex-husband and refused to go to a nearby domestic violence shelter.
The case worker said the other three children appear very safe and bonded to their foster parents, who are willing to adopt them.
Watkins argued that because Hanick is now in prison, the threat of abuse has been removed.
However, the appellate court found there was substantial evidence to support the agency’s motion for permanent custody.
“… The testimony regarding the negative aspects of mother’s behavior … outweighed the positive,” Rice stated.
Eleventh District Judge Thomas R. Wright concurred.
Appellate Judge Colleen Mary O’Toole dissented, stating she would reverse and remand the case.
“I do not find the agency carried its burden of proving by clear and convincing evidence that the children could not be placed with mother.”
O’Toole stated that Watkins completed parenting classes, fed them and properly clothed them.
“The majority notes that the termination of parental rights is the family law equivalent of the death penalty, and the agency must carry its burden by clear and convincing evidence,” O’Toole wrote in her dissenting opinion.
In the Matter Of: C.C., J.H., and M.H., Dependent Children, is cited 2016-T-0050 and 2016-T-0058.