Facts: In juvenile court, Grandparents petitioned to have Children declared dependent and neglected in Mother’s and Father’s care, and the juvenile court found as much.

Mother and Father appealed that decision to circuit court, but later entered an agreed order stipulating that Children were dependent and neglected and agreed it was in Children’s best interest to remain in the custody of Grandparents. The case was then remanded back to juvenile court to enforce the order.

One year later, Grandparents petitioned the juvenile court to reduce the parenting time of Mother and Father.

After a hearing in July 2019, the juvenile court magistrate entered a temporary order limiting Father’s parenting time.

On October 4, 2019, the juvenile court magistrate entered a “final order” finding that a material change has occurred and that it’s in Children’s best interest to suspend Mother’s and Father’s parenting time. No one requested a rehearing with the juvenile court judge from the magistrate’s order.

On November 26, 2019, Father filed a notice of appeal to the circuit court. A de novo trial occurred the following summer. The circuit court entered an order on August 11, 2020, like that entered by the juvenile court magistrate the previous year, i.e., finding that a material change of circumstances occurred and that it’s in Children’s best interest to reduce Father’s parenting time.

On September 10, 2020, Father filed a notice of appeal to the Court of Appeals from the circuit court’s August 11, 2020, order.

On Appeal: The Court of Appeals reversed the trial court.

Tennessee juvenile courts have exclusive original jurisdiction over dependency and neglect cases. This exclusive jurisdiction continues unless:

• the case is dismissed;
• the custody determination is transferred to another court; or
• a petition for adoption has been filed.

Unless one of these three occurs, a later decision by the juvenile court on whether to modify an initial custody order arises out of and remains part of the dependency and neglect proceeding. This is true even if a petition does not reference the dependency and neglect hearing and is filed years after the final order is entered.

The Court found that Father’s appeal of the circuit court order was untimely because his appeal to the circuit court was untimely:

[Tennessee Code Annotated] § 37-1-159(a) provides that “[a]ny appeal from any final order or judgment” in a dependency and neglect proceeding, may be made to the circuit court and be perfected within ten days following the entry of the juvenile court’s order. Here, the juvenile court magistrate entered his order on October 4, 2019. Therefore, pursuant to § 37-1-107, if no request for a rehearing before a judge was filed within 10 days, the magistrate’s order became a final order of the juvenile court on October 14, 2019. Accordingly, the parties then had ten days from that date in which to file their appeal with the circuit court pursuant to § 37-1-159. Father did not file his appeal to the circuit court until November 26, 2019. This appeal was, therefore, not timely filed as required by § 37-1-159(a), and as a result, the circuit court did not have subject-matter jurisdiction over Father’s appeal.

The circuit court’s lack of subject-matter jurisdiction over Father’s appeal pretermitted consideration of the propriety of the circuit court’s substantive rulings. Father’s appeal was dismissed.

In re Kendall R. (Tennessee Court of Appeals, Middle Section, March 2, 2022).

If you found this helpful, please share it using the buttons below.