In 1998, the Berrien County Department of Family and Children Services DFCS took a two-month-old boy into emergency custody and later filed petitions in the Juvenile Court of Berrien County alleging that the child was deprived. The child was placed with his paternal grandfather, who along with his step-grandmother, subsequently petitioned the Berrien County Superior Court for adoption of the child. Proceedings were transferred from juvenile court to superior court. Following a hearing in superior court, the parental rights of the child’s natural parents were terminated, and the petition for adoption was granted. In Case No. A03A2502, the natural parents appeal the order of the superior court terminating their parental rights and granting the adoption. In Case No. A03A2503, the paternal grandparents appeal a subsequent order of the superior court refusing to dismiss the parents’ appeal for failure to file the transcript in a timely manner. We affirm the order appealed in Case No. A03A2502 and dismiss the appeal in Case No. A03A2503 as moot. The standard of review on appeal from a termination of parental rights is whether, after reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the trial court’s disposition, any rational trier of fact could have found by clear and convincing evidence that the natural parent’s right to custody should be terminated. On appeal, this Court neither weighs evidence nor determines the credibility of witnesses; rather, we defer to the trial court’s factfinding and affirm unless the appellate standard is not met.1 The considerations for terminating parental rights involve a two-step process. The trial court must first determine whether there is present clear and convincing evidence of parental misconduct or inability. Such conduct or inability may be proved by showing, inter alia, that 1 the child is deprived; 2 such deprivation is caused by the lack of proper parental care or control by the parent in question; 3 the deprivation is likely to continue; and 4 the continued deprivation will cause or is likely to cause serious physical, mental, emotional, or moral harm to the child.2 A “deprived child” is one who “is without proper parental care or control, subsistence, education as required by law, or other care or control necessary for his physical, mental, or emotional health or morals.” . . . Deprivation may be shown to have resulted from parental unfitness that is either intentional or unintentional misconduct resulting in the abuse or neglect of a child by what is tantamount to physical or mental incapability to care for the child.3 On December 15, 1998, the Berrien County DFCS was notified that a man and his wife had brought their two-month-old son to the hospital with multiple leg fractures. Upon being interviewed by DFCS personnel, the parents’ description of how the child broke his leg in several different places was not consistent with the fractures. As a result, DFCS took the child into emergency custody upon his release from the hospital.
About a week later, the Juvenile Court of Berrien County ordered DFCS to place the child in shelter care, and DFCS placed him with the paternal grandfather. A couple of months later, the juvenile court adopted a family-reunification case plan submitted by DFCS. The case plan noted that the parents had housing and income, and thus the ability to provide food, shelter, and clothing for the child. The case plan, however, identified a need on the part of the parents to deal with stress, anger, and frustration so as not to place the child at risk of physical harm. To this end, the reunification plan required the parents to obtain counseling, take parenting classes, submit to psychological evaluations, and schedule weekly visits with the child.
