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In the Interest of A. B.

The 15-year-old mother ran away without a trace before her premature child was discharged from the hospital.

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The mother of A. B. appeals a deprivation finding that led to A. B.’s being placed into the temporary custody of DFACS. Challenging the sufficiency of the evidence, she argues that the juvenile court should have focused on the adequate care given to the child by its grandmother rather than on the mother’s abandonment. We disagree, holding that the evidence of the mother’s abandonment was the proper focus and supported the court’s finding of deprivation. Accordingly, we affirm. 1. “On appeal from a determination that a child is deprived, we review the evidence in the light most favorable to the juvenile court’s judgment to determine whether any rational trier of fact could have found by clear and convincing evidence that the child was deprived.” Punctuation omitted. In the Interest of J. W. 1

So construed, the evidence shows that A. B., who was born three months premature to a fifteen-year-old mother in late January 2007, experienced serious medical problems including blindness in one eye, severe iron deficiency requiring supplements, and heart murmurs and had to remain in the hospital until March. Claiming depression, the mother failed to visit A. B. in the hospital and ran away, leaving no trace as to her whereabouts.2 Because of this abandonment, A. B.’s maternal grandmother was compelled to take the child upon its discharge from the hospital in March and to apply for temporary custody of the child, which the juvenile court granted based on a probable cause finding of deprivation. When DFACS became aware of the situation in August, it petitioned the court for a full finding of deprivation based on abandonment, which led to an evidentiary hearing later that month that the mother attended with counsel.

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