IN RE: Commitment of Guardianship (2000)

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department, New York.

IN RE: Commitment of Guardianship, etc., NICOLE MONIQUE H., etc., A Dependent Child Under the Age of Eighteen Years, etc., Wilbert H., Respondent-Appellant, St. Joseph Services for Children and Families, Petitioner-Respondent.

Decided: March 30, 2000

TOM, J.P., ELLERIN, WALLACH, RUBIN and SAXE, JJ.

Emily Granrud, for Nicole Monique H. John A. Pappalardo, for Respondent-Appellant. Helen McTaggart, for Petitioner-Respondent.

Order of disposition, Family Court, New York County (Mary Bednar, J.), entered on or about August 6, 1997, which, upon a finding of permanent neglect, terminated respondent's parental rights to the subject child and committed the child's custody and guardianship to petitioner agency and the Commissioner of Social Services for the purposes of adoption, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

The finding of permanent neglect is supported by clear and convincing evidence that respondent substantially failed to maintain contact with the child and also failed to enter a drug rehabilitation program that the agency had arranged for him (see, Matter of Star Leslie W., 63 N.Y.2d 136, 142-143, 481 N.Y.S.2d 26, 470 N.E.2d 824; Matter of Natajha Starr M., 204 A.D.2d 232, 612 N.Y.S.2d 413, lv. denied 84 N.Y.2d 806, 621 N.Y.S.2d 515, 645 N.E.2d 1215). Respondent's parental rights were properly terminated in view of his failure to come forward with any plan for the child's care other than one that would have her wait for his release from prison and drug rehabilitation, and evidence that the child is doing well with the stable foster family with which she has lived since she was two weeks old and that wants to adopt her.

MEMORANDUM DECISION.

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