DES MOINES — Parents must be given priority in regaining custody of their children in cases where others have cared for their children through guardianship, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled Friday.
In a decision in the case of a single mother and her child’s grandparents, the court found that parents have a fundamental right to care, custody and control of their children.
The court stated that in cases where parents seek the return of their children and the dissolution of guardianship, “the juvenile court must make the rebuttable presumption that the best interests of the child are in the best interests of the child by the reunification of the minor child with his or her parent.”
The ruling was prompted by the case of a girl who was born in Webster City in May 2009 to a 16-year-old woman. The girl’s parents married in 2011 and lived with her father’s parents until July 2013, when she and her parents moved into their own home.
The marriage failed and the child lived with his grandparents again, receiving a visit from his mother at the weekend. In 2014, the mother and grandparents agreed on temporary guardianship so that the child could benefit from the grandparents’ health insurance and travel with them.
In 2018, the mother wrote a letter to the grandparents asking them to end guardianship and regain custody of their daughter, but received no response. She hired legal counsel to begin proceedings in June 2020 to end the then 11-year-old girl’s guardianship.
By this time, the mother had a job and had been living with her boyfriend in a single-family home in Woolstock, Wright County, for at least three years. She had a bedroom for her daughter and said she was ready and able to be a parent.
The juvenile court terminated the guardianship, concluding that the mother proved that the guardianship was no longer necessary and that the termination did not harm the child.
The grandparents appealed and the Iowa Court of Appeals overturned the juvenile court, concluding that the guardianship benefited the child and the child’s interest outweighed the mother’s interest.
The Supreme Court overturned the appeals court on Friday.
“Given the fundamental liberty interests of parents in the care, custody and control of their children, and the assumption that eligible parents act in their children’s best interests, we must give due consideration to the overriding rights of an eligible, appropriate and appropriate parent ‘above all.’ others,” Chief Justice Susan Christensen wrote in the opinion, which the court unanimously supported.
Lawyers for the mother and grandparents did not immediately respond to messages asking for comment on the verdict.
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