C.A. 2nd;
B281438

The Second Appellate District reversed a dependency court order and remanded. The court held that the dependency court's error in failing to timely appoint counsel for a parent resulted in a miscarriage of justice.

J.P. was removed from his mother's care in 2011, when he was five years old. The court appointed counsel to represent mother at the detention hearing. After a contested jurisdiction and disposition hearing in March 2012, the court sustained the allegations of the dependency petition, denied mother reunification services, issued a three-year restraining order limiting mother's contact with J.P. to monitored visits. J.P. was placed in foster care, but was later transferred to a group home, where he remained. In 2014, the dependency court, without explanation in the record, relieved mother's counsel. On November 3, 2016, mother filed a Welf. & Inst. Code §388 petition requesting reappointment of counsel, family reunification services, and extended and liberalized visits with J.P., including “unmonitored off ground visits and overnight visits.” At a previously scheduled review hearing on November 8, upon inquiry by J.P.'s counsel, the dependency court expressly refused to appoint counsel for mother. At hearing on mother's §388 petition on December 8, 2016, the court ordered six months of reunification services, but denied mother's requests for unmonitored visits and appointment of counsel.