The juvenile court entered an order terminating the parental rights of the mother of C. T., S. T., Z. K., and L. K.1 The mother appeals, arguing that her rights were terminated without clear and convincing evidence of parental misconduct or inability. She also contends that the juvenile court erred in determining that termination was in the children’s best interest. For reasons which follow, we reverse. 1. As a threshold matter, we must address grave shortcomings with respect to the record citations in the briefs. At the hearing in this matter, the attorney for the Department of Family and Children Services “DFCS” asked the juvenile court to leave the record open in order for it to tender a certified copy of the court’s record, which was to be admitted as exhibit one. The court agreed, and the entire record —consisting of well over 100 pages —was attached to the transcript as exhibit one. The exhibit was not numbered. Nonetheless, in its brief, DFCS relies largely upon this lengthy, unnumbered exhibit to support its factual assertions. After the first factual assertion on page two of its brief, DFCS simply cites to “Dep’t Ex. 1.” For the next 5 1/2 pages, the only citation DFCS provides is “Id.” Thus, the citations to the record are essentially useless. Indeed, DFCS does not even bother to specify to which document in the voluminous exhibit it refers, such as pointing to a case plan or an order of a specified date. The mother’s brief utilizes similarly vague references to “Ex. 1.”
Under this Court’s rules, references to the record must be both to a specific volume or part of the record and by specific page number.2 Moreover, this Court has made abundantly clear that we will not cull the record on behalf of a party.3 Thus, it is incumbent upon the parties to ensure that the record arrives at this Court in a manner designed to facilitate our review of the record. Here, given that the record was unnumbered, the record citations are wholly inadequate. Under these circumstances, we will not sift through the multitudinous documents in an attempt to ascertain what transpired below.4 If we have omitted any fact or failed to locate relevant evidence, the responsibility lies with counsel.5
