Opinion
B315994
04-19-2022
In re M.G., a Person Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. v. A.J., Defendant and Appellant. LOS ANGELES COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF CHILDREN AND FAMILY SERVICES, Plaintiff and Respondent,
Patricia K. Saucier, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant. Rodrigo A. Castro-Silva, County Counsel, Kim Nemoy, Assistant County Counsel, Sally Son, Deputy County Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County No. DK23604C, Stephanie M. Davis, Judge Pro Tempore of the Juvenile Court. Affirmed.
Patricia K. Saucier, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.
Rodrigo A. Castro-Silva, County Counsel, Kim Nemoy, Assistant County Counsel, Sally Son, Deputy County Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
EGERTON, J.
Mother appeals an order terminating her parental rights to her four-year-old son M.G. She contends the juvenile court abused its discretion by denying her request for a contested hearing to consider the beneficial parent relationship exception to adoption and her request for an updated adoption assessment. The court concluded mother's failure to maintain consistent and regular visitation with M.G. throughout the dependency proceeding precluded her from establishing the exception, even if the court credited her offer of proof regarding her most recent visits with the child. The juvenile court reasonably assessed the evidence and mother's offer of proof. We affirm.
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
1. Detention and Jurisdiction
M.G. was born in January 2017. On April 18, 2017, the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services (Department) filed a dependency petition on behalf of M.G. and his half-siblings alleging M.G.'s father's gang activity and mother's substance abuse put the children at risk. The same day the juvenile court ordered M.G. detained from father and released to mother's custody.
Mother has two other children with a different father. Those children are not part of this appeal.
In March 2017, the Department received a referral alleging M.G.'s father was gang affiliated and a suspect in a shooting that occurred at M.G.'s paternal grandmother's home. Law enforcement later determined father was not the proper suspect; however, investigators found marijuana in mother's home. Mother told the Department she smoked marijuana when the children were with their maternal grandmother. Although she said she was unsure if father was still an active gang member, her social media page showed she had posted photographs of father displaying gang signs.
On August 24, 2017, the Department filed a petition to detain M.G. from mother's custody, alleging the parents had an altercation over the infant that caused abrasions to M.G.'s knee and face. Mother denied the incident occurred, claimed M.G. scratched himself, and disputed a police report that father lived in the home and that mother reported prior domestic violence incidents. The juvenile court found the police report credible, detained M.G. from mother's custody, and ordered mother to have monitored visits with the infant a minimum of twice a week for two hours each visit.
On March 8, 2018, the juvenile court declared M.G. a dependent child, sustaining the originally alleged counts and new counts regarding the parents' domestic violence and mother's violation of the court's order prohibiting father from having physical contact with the infant.
2. Reunification Efforts
During the first six-month review period, mother had once-a-week monitored visitation, which was liberalized to unmonitored visitation for six to eight hours per visit. Mother and M.G. also had video calls once or twice a week. M.G. appeared to be bonded to mother. In November 2018, the juvenile court ordered mother's visitation to be liberalized to overnight visits once she produced two consecutive clean drug tests.
In December 2018, the Department placed M.G. with his maternal great aunt and uncle. The aunt reported mother continued to have unmonitored visits with the child; however, her visits had decreased from eight hours a week to one hour a week. Mother had completed some court-ordered services, but she was not consistently drug testing and she failed to have overnight visits with M.G.
In early February 2019, mother's visits were temporarily paused when she failed to comply with the court's order to drug test twice consecutively. Later that month, the court approved a written visitation schedule granting mother unmonitored visits with M.G. every Friday for eight hours. Under the visitation schedule, mother was to pick up M.G. from his daycare and return him at the end of the visit.
On March 15, 2019, the Department received a referral from M.G.'s daycare provider alleging mother was under the influence of marijuana during an unmonitored visit with M.G. Mother missed her drug test that day, as well as two other tests scheduled for later that month. She continued to miss drug tests through April and May, until she tested positive for marijuana on May 14, 2019.
According to M.G.'s daycare provider, as of April 5, 2019, mother had had only two unmonitored visits with the child.
On May 29, 2019, the juvenile court terminated mother's reunification services, set the matter for a selection and implementation hearing under Welfare and Institutions Code section 366.26, and ordered visitation to remain in full force and effect. The court found mother had made minimal progress on her case plan.
Statutory references are to the Welfare and Institutions Code.
In September 2019, the Department reported M.G.'s maternal great aunt and uncle were committed to adopting the child. Mother continued to have weekly unmonitored visits with M.G. The aunt observed the quality of mother's visits was good and mother appeared to have a "parental bond" with M.G.; however, mother's visits at the aunt's home were "sporadic."
3. Section 388 Petitions
On September 25, 2019, mother filed a section 388 petition to have M.G. returned to her custody and to restart reunification services. She alleged her circumstances had changed because she had enrolled in a drug treatment program and she was having regular visits with M.G. The juvenile court granted a hearing on the petition.
On January 30, 2020, the Department filed a section 388 petition to revert mother's visitation to monitored visits. According to M.G.'s daycare provider, after the child returned from a recent unsupervised visit with mother, his clothes smelled strongly of marijuana. The next day, mother refused to submit to an on-demand drug test. The court ordered mother's visits to be monitored pending a combined hearing on mother's and the Department's petitions.
In May 2020, the Department modified mother's visitation to virtual visits due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Mother filed a request for review of the modification and reported she had had no visits with M.G. between March 20 and May 9, 2020, and she had had only video and phone calls with him since then. On June 17, 2020, the juvenile court granted mother one in-person, monitored visit with M.G., with the remainder of the visits to take place virtually.
On February 5, 2021, the Department reported mother had not contacted her social worker since Thanksgiving. Mother did not ask about M.G.'s birthday in January and, although the caregiver had invited mother and the maternal grandmother to a drive-by birthday celebration, only the grandmother attended. The caregiver later arranged a video call with mother for M.G.'s birthday. Apart from that video call, mother had had only three visits with her son since July 2020.
After several continuances due to the pandemic, on February 23, 2021, the juvenile court held a hearing on the pending section 388 petitions. Mother testified. She said she had six or seven visits with M.G. since July 2020 and, although she called to video chat with him "literally every day," the caregivers had answered only "two or three times." She denied the caregiver invited her to M.G.'s birthday celebration. She confirmed she currently lived in Las Vegas, and she could not recall the last time she had seen M.G. in person.
Mother denied smoking marijuana during the unmonitored visit with M.G. in early 2020. She said her godbrother had dropped off M.G. after the visit because her car was in the shop, and it was her godbrother's car that smelled of marijuana.
As for her failure to maintain monthly contact with the Department, mother testified it was the social worker's responsibility to contact her every Friday for her scheduled virtual visits with M.G. Mother later acknowledged Friday was the social worker's day off, and she could not explain why she had failed to call the social worker on days other than Friday when the visits did not occur as scheduled.
The juvenile court denied mother's petition and granted the Department's, ordering mother's visitation to revert to monitored visits. The court found mother had not maintained regular and consistent visitation with M.G. and her explanations for failing to communicate with the Department about visitation were "lacking." The court found returning M.G. to mother's custody would not be in the child's best interest, as the incident when M.G. returned from a visit smelling of marijuana demonstrated mother still lacked "insight and good judgment" about her parental responsibilities.
4. Section 366.26 Hearing
On February 5, 2021, the Department filed its section 366.26 report, recommending adoption as the permanent plan for M.G. The four-year-old had been placed with his maternal great aunt and uncle for more than two years and the caregivers remained committed to adopting him. In a June 7, 2021 report, the Department reaffirmed its recommendation, noting the caregivers continued to meet M.G.'s needs and there were no known barriers to adoption.
The juvenile court continued the section 366.26 hearing several times, including on February 23, 2021, to accommodate a hearing on mother's and the Department's section 388 petitions, to allow M.G. and his caregivers to engage additional services, and to conduct further due diligence on father.
On June 23, 2021, the court held the section 366.26 hearing. Mother objected to the sufficiency of the Department's report, arguing it was inadequate with respect to visitation because it had not been updated since February 2021. She also requested a contested hearing to consider evidence relevant to the beneficial parent relationship exception to adoption. As an offer of proof, mother asserted she had been having weekly video calls with M.G. for the past four months and she had two in-person visits with him in May and June 2021. Mother also argued earlier visitation reports reflected a strong parent-child bond.
The juvenile court denied mother's request for a contested hearing. In assessing mother's offer of proof, the court assumed mother had had weekly virtual visits and some in-person visits with M.G. in the past four months, but the court emphasized it was compelled to consider the "overall circumstances"- not just recent events. Those circumstances included mother's admissions about her failure to visit with M.G. regularly in the eight months preceding the section 388 hearing; mother's decision to move to another state during that eight-month period, which made visitation with the four-year-old child "exceptionally difficult"; and mother's conduct during unmonitored visits that resulted in the current monitored visitation order. In view of those overall circumstances, the court concluded mother would be unable to establish the beneficial parent relationship exception, even if the evidence identified in her offer of proof were credited.
After hearing argument from counsel, the court entered an order finding M.G. was adoptable; it would be detrimental to M.G. to be returned to mother's custody; mother had "not maintained regular visitation with the child and ha[d] not established a bond with the child"; and the benefits M.G. would receive through the permanency of adoption outweighed the benefit of continuing his relationship with mother. Based on those findings, the court terminated mother's parental rights and released M.G. for adoption. Mother filed a timely appeal from the order.
DISCUSSION
1. The Beneficial Parent Relationship Exception to Adoption
"The sole purpose of the section 366.26 hearing is to select and implement a permanent plan for the child after reunification efforts have failed." (In re J.D. (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 833, 851- 852 (J.D.); In re Marilyn H. (1993) 5 Cal.4th 295, 304; see also § 366.26, subd. (b).) At that stage, "the welfare agency's focus shifts from monitoring the parents' progress toward reunification to determining the appropriate placement plan for the child." (Marilyn H., at p. 305.) "The dependency statutes embody a presumptive rule that, after reunification efforts have failed, parental rights must be terminated in order to free a child for adoption." (J.D., at p. 852, citing In re Caden C. (2021) 11 Cal.5th 614, 630-631 (Caden C.).) However, the statutes provide an exception where "[t]he parents have maintained regular visitation and contact with the child and the child would benefit from continuing the relationship." (§ 366.26, subd. (c)(1)(B)(i); J.D., at p. 852.)
The beneficial parent relationship exception has three elements, each of which the parent must prove by a preponderance of the evidence: (1) regular visitation and contact with the child, taking into account the extent of visitation permitted; (2) the child has a substantial, positive, emotional attachment to the parent; and (3) terminating that attachment would be detrimental to the child even when balanced against the countervailing benefit of a new, adoptive home. (Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 636.)" 'The relationship that gives rise to this exception . . . "characteristically aris[es] from day-to-day interaction, companionship and shared experiences. Day-to-day contact is not necessarily required, although it is typical in a parent-child relationship." '" (In re G.B. (2014) 227 Cal.App.4th 1147, 1165.) When the benefits of a stable, adoptive, permanent home outweigh the harm the child would experience from the loss of a continued parent-child relationship, the court should order adoption. (Caden C., at p. 634.) The statutory reasons for departing from" 'the norm'" of adoption apply only in" 'exceptional circumstances.'" (Id. at p. 631.)
In its order terminating mother's parental rights, the juvenile court found mother failed to satisfy her burden of proof on all three elements of the beneficial parent relationship exception. We need focus on only the first element, however, as the lack of regular and consistent visitation alone "fatally undermine[s] any attempt to find the beneficial parental relationship exception." (In re I.R. (2014) 226 Cal.App.4th 201, 212; In re Jeanette V. (1998) 68 Cal.App.4th 811, 817 (Jeanette V.) [offer of proof regarding quality of visitation insufficient to require contested hearing because parent's "failure to satisfy the 'maintain regular visitation and contact' element" mandated rejection of exception to adoption]; see In re Grace P. (2017) 8 Cal.App.5th 605, 614 (Grace P.) ["evidence of the nature of the visits [is] ineffective in proving a beneficial parent-child relationship, where the parent failed to maintain consistent and frequent contact with the child"].)
As our Supreme Court explained in Caden C., "[t]he first element-regular visitation and contact-is straightforward. The question is just whether 'parents visit consistently,' taking into account 'the extent permitted by court orders.' [Citation.] Visits and contact 'continue[ ] or develop[ ] a significant, positive, emotional attachment from child to parent.' [Citation.] Courts should consider in that light whether parents 'maintained regular visitation and contact with the child' [citation] but certainly not to punish parents or reward them for good behavior in visiting or maintaining contact-here, as throughout, the focus is on the best interests of the child." (Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 632.) When a parent challenges the juvenile court's factual determination that the parent has not maintained consistent contact with the child, the substantial evidence standard of review applies. (Id. at pp. 639-640.)
Here, mother does not directly challenge the court's factual finding that she failed to maintain consistent visitation with M.G. Rather, she contends the termination order must be reversed because the court made erroneous procedural rulings -denying her requests for a contested hearing and an updated adoption assessment-that undermine its findings regarding the exception. Those challenged rulings are quintessentially discretionary decisions that we review for an abuse of discretion. (See Grace P., supra, 8 Cal.App.5th at p. 611 ["We review the court's denial of a contested hearing for an abuse of discretion."]; In re Urayna L. (1999) 75 Cal.App.4th 883, 886 (Urayna L.) [juvenile court has discretion to order child welfare agency to update adoption report before proceeding with section 366.26 hearing].)
2. The Juvenile Court Reasonably Exercised Its Discretion to Deny a Contested Hearing
We begin with mother's contention that the court abused its discretion by denying her request for a contested selection and implementation hearing. As this court explained in Grace P., a parent has a "right to due process at a section 366.26 hearing resulting in the termination of parental rights, which includes a meaningful opportunity to be heard, present evidence, and confront witnesses. However, these procedural rights are subject to evidentiary principles. Due process is 'a flexible concept dependent on the circumstances.' [Citation.] Since due process does not authorize a parent 'to introduce irrelevant evidence, due process does not require a court to hold a contested hearing if it is not convinced the parent will present relevant evidence on the issue he or she seeks to contest.' [Citation.] 'The trial court can therefore exercise its power to request an offer of proof to clearly identify the contested issue(s) so it can determine whether a parent's representation is sufficient to warrant a hearing involving presentation of evidence and confrontation and cross-examination of witnesses.' [Citation.] The parent's offer of proof 'must be specific, setting forth the actual evidence to be produced, not merely the facts or issues to be addressed and argued.'" (Grace P., supra, 8 Cal.App.5th at p. 612.)
Mother's offer of proof addressed only the regular visitation and contact element of the beneficial parent relationship exception-specifically, the extent of mother's visitation with M.G. during the most recent four months. Her counsel stated: "[T]he situation for mother's visitation is completely different than it was four months ago. She's been having weekly visits over . . . a video service. Mother's out of state, so in person is not as frequent, but she has been having weekly video visits with the minor. [¶] In addition, she had a multiple day visit May 17th through 19th with the minor where they spent extended time together. She most recently, on the 19th of this month, had an in-person visit."
In connection with requesting a contested hearing, mother's counsel also referred to prior "visitation reports," which she argued "indicated the very strong bond between this minor and mother." However, these past reports were already in evidence, and counsel did not identify any additional evidence that mother would produce at a contested hearing regarding the second or third elements of the exception.
The juvenile court denied mother's request for a contested hearing, concluding that, even if credited, evidence regarding the past four months of visitation would be insufficient to establish the exception when considered within the "overall circumstances" of the case. On the record before juvenile court, a four-month period of regular visitation would not have compelled a finding that mother visited consistently with M.G. to the extent permitted by the court's orders. (Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 632.) Thus, we cannot say the court abused its discretion in denying the request for a contested hearing to present this evidence.
The record shows the consistency of mother's visitation with M.G. began to deteriorate shortly after the six-month review period. Despite the court's order to liberalize mother's visitation to overnight visits once she produced two consecutive clean drug tests, mother failed to achieve those overnight visits. And, while the court's order permitted mother to have weekly visits for six to eight hours at a time, M.G.'s caretaker reported the length of mother's visits had decreased to just one hour a week after the review hearing.
In February 2019, the court approved a written visitation schedule granting mother unmonitored visits with M.G. every Friday for eight hours. But as of April 5, 2019, M.G.'s daycare provider reported mother had had only two unmonitored visits with the child. In May 2020, while objecting to the Department's COVID-19 mitigation measures, mother acknowledged that, despite the availability of weekly virtual visits, she had had no visits with M.G. between March 20 and May 9.
Critically, at the beginning of February 2021, the Department reported mother had not asked about M.G.'s birthday or attended a drive-by celebration for him in January, and she had had only three visits with her now-four-year-old son since July 2020. While mother testified she had "maybe six or seven" visits during the period and had made efforts to contact M.G. that were not reflected in the Department's reports, she admitted she made no meaningful effort to contact her social worker to ensure she was visiting with M.G. to the extent permitted by the court's orders. In assessing mother's offer of proof, the juvenile court specifically referred to this testimony as a principal reason to deny the request for a contested hearing.
Relying on In re D.M. (2021) 71 Cal.App.5th 261 (D.M.), mother contends her offer of proof was sufficient to warrant a contested hearing because she was not required to demonstrate "perfectly consistent visitation over a years-long timeframe" in order to satisfy the beneficial parent relationship exception's first element. We do not disagree with that general proposition, but the appellate posture of D.M. was fundamentally different. There, the father visited his children at least once per week over a four-year period, increasing to twice per week before the section 366.26 hearing. (D.M., at pp. 265-268.) Although there were two significant gaps in the father's visitation-three months of no contact in the first year and three months of limited contact in the third year-the juvenile court found the father had nevertheless visited" 'fairly consistently, '" while ultimately concluding his bond with the children had" 'not risen to the level of a parent.'" (Id. at pp. 266-268.) In an opinion that focused on the second and third elements of the beneficial parent relationship exception, the D.M. court observed that, while the father's visitation "was not perfect," substantial evidence supported the juvenile court's finding that he "regularly visited the children over the course of the years-long dependency." (Id. at pp. 269-270.)
Here, in contrast to D.M., the juvenile court found that even if mother's offer of proof about her visitation during the most recent four months were credited, she still would not meet her burden to prove she consistently visited with M.G. given the "overall circumstances" of the case. Much as the D.M. court was required to draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the lower court's finding that visitation was fairly consistent, in reviewing the juvenile court's ruling for an abuse of discretion here, we must view the evidence"' "most favorably in support of the trial court's action" '" and cannot interfere with the court's ruling unless, under all the evidence,"' "no judge could reasonably have made the order that he [or she] did." '" (In re Robert L. (1993) 21 Cal.App.4th 1057, 1067; see also Caden C., supra, 11 Cal.5th at p. 641 [Under abuse of discretion standard," '" '[w]hen two or more inferences can reasonably be deduced from the facts, the reviewing court has no authority to substitute its decision for that of the trial court.'"' "].) And, because mother had the burden to prove the first element of the beneficial relationship exception, we cannot find the juvenile court abused its discretion unless the evidence identified in her offer of proof would have compelled a finding that she consistently and regularly visited with M.G., as a matter of law. (See In re Aurora P. (2015) 241 Cal.App.4th 1142, 1163 [where issue on appeal turns on "[appellants'] failure of proof at trial, the question is 'whether the evidence compels a finding in favor of the appellant[s] as a matter of law' "]; In re I.W. (2009) 180 Cal.App.4th 1517, 1527-1528, overruled on other grounds by Conservatorship of O.B. (2020) 9 Cal.5th 989, 1010, fn. 7 [because mother had burden to prove exception to adoption, reviewing court could reverse termination of parental rights only if her "evidence was (1) 'uncontradicted and unimpeached' and (2) 'of such a character and weight as to leave no room for a judicial determination that it was insufficient to support a finding'" in her favor].)
Given the record of significant lapses in mother's visitation with M.G., including her admission that she visited with him at most six or seven times during an eight-month period, evidence of regular weekly visits during a four-month period would not have been sufficient to compel a finding that mother consistently visited with her son to the extent permitted by the court's orders. (See In re C.F. (2011) 193 Cal.App.4th 549, 554 [where mother missed nine visits in first 12-month period, visited consistently with children for next year, saw them just three times in subsequent three-month period, but adhered to thrice-weekly visitation schedule in month prior to section 366.26 hearing, evidence was sufficient to support juvenile court's implicit finding that "overall her visitation was sporadic" and "insufficient to satisfy the first prong of the parent-child relationship exception to adoption"].) The juvenile court did not abuse its discretion in denying mother's request for a contested hearing. (See Jeanette V., supra, 68 Cal.App.4th at p. 817.)
The other cases mother relies upon are inapposite because the record in each case compelled a finding that the parents regularly visited with their children. (See Grace P., supra, 8 Cal.App.5th at p. 614 ["Father satisfied the first prong in the case at bar, [thus] his proffered evidence was consequential to and probative of the issue of his relationship with the children and the detriment they would suffer by its severance."]; In re A.G. (2020) 58 Cal.App.5th 973, 1014 [record demonstrated "mother had maintained regular contact with the minor, satisfying the first component of the parental relationship exception," thus remand was appropriate to allow her to cure deficiencies in her partially-compliant offer of proof].)
3. The Juvenile Court Reasonably Exercised Its Discretion to Decline an Updated Adoption Assessment
The same analysis supports the juvenile court's decision to proceed with the section 366.26 hearing over mother's objection that the adoption assessment did not include an account of her visitation with M.G. during the most recent four months. In light of the significant lapses recounted above, an updated report on four months of regular visitation would not have compelled the juvenile court to find mother consistently visited with M.G. as required to establish the beneficial parent relationship exception to adoption. Thus, the juvenile court reasonably proceeded with the selection and implementation hearing, notwithstanding mother's implicit request for an updated adoption assessment.
Under section 366.22, subdivision (c), whenever the juvenile court orders a section 366.26 hearing to be held, the court must "direct the agency supervising the child and the county adoption agency . . . to prepare an assessment that shall include: [¶] . . . [¶] (B) A review of the amount of and nature of any contact between the child and his or her parents . . . since the time of placement." (§ 366.22, subd. (c)(1)(B).) Consistent with this mandate, the record shows the juvenile court ordered the Department to file an adoption assessment when it set the section 366.26 hearing, and the Department filed an adoption assessment for the originally scheduled hearing on September 26, 2019 and for the continued hearing on February 23, 2021. Mother does not dispute these assessments were adequate when filed.
In its February 2021 assessment, the Department reported mother had had only three visits with M.G. between July 2020 and February 2021. On February 23, 2021, mother testified in connection with the pending section 388 petitions and admitted she had visited with M.G. no more than six or seven times during this eight-month period. After finding mother had "not maintained regular and consistent visitation" with M.G., the court continued the section 366.26 hearing to June 23, 2021 to allow the Department to conduct further due diligence on father. Mother contends the juvenile court abused its discretion by proceeding with the continued section 366.26 hearing in the absence of an update on her visitation during that interim four-month period.
In Urayna L., the mother similarly challenged a termination order, arguing the juvenile court abused its discretion by proceeding with the section 366.26 hearing despite the child welfare agency's failure to provide statutorily mandated information about the nature of the relationship between the child and her maternal grandmother. (Urayna L., supra, 75 Cal.App.4th at pp. 885-886; § 366.22, subd. (c)(1)(B) [adoption assessment shall include a "review of the amount of and nature of any contact between the child and his or her parents and other members of his or her extended family [including grandparents] since the time of placement"].) This court concluded mother waived the challenge by failing to object to the assessment, reasoning that if the contacts between the child and her maternal grandmother were "not adequately described," the burden rested on the mother to object and to "put on evidence of how those visits went, and what it was about them which had any bearing on the issue of termination of her parental rights." (Urayna L., at p. 886.) The Urayna L. court explained: "Here, [the child welfare agency] did make the report listing the contacts between [the child] and her grandmother; mother's contention that the report was not adequate is just the kind of issue which should be developed by putting on one's own evidence or cross-examining the person who prepared the report. In other words, once [the child welfare agency] puts on some evidence of the contacts, . . . it is up to the parent to produce evidence that, in fact, the minor would benefit from continuing the relationship so much that termination of the parental rights is inappropriate." (Id. at p. 887.)
To be sure, mother did not waive her challenge to the adequacy of the Department's adoption assessment by failing to object. However, much as the Urayna L. mother's "silence" suggested she could not have produced "anything [that] was not included in the reports . . . [that] might have helped her case" (Urayna L., supra, 75 Cal.App.4th at p. 886), so too here, mother's offer of proof confirmed the missing visitation evidence would not have helped her establish the beneficial parent relationship exception to adoption. Because the juvenile court had ample evidence reasonably to conclude mother did not consistently visit with M.G., even when crediting mother's offer of proof, the court did not abuse its discretion by proceeding with the section 366.26 hearing over mother's objection.
The other cases mother relies upon are inapposite because in each case the parent satisfied the regular visitation element of the beneficial parent relationship exception. (See D.M., supra, 71 Cal.App.5th at p. 270 [substantial evidence supported finding "father regularly visited the children over the course of the years-long dependency"]; J.D., supra, 70 Cal.App.5th at p. 854 ["the first element, regular visitation and contact, is not in dispute"; the agency "concedes mother satisfied this element"]; In re B.D. (2021) 66 Cal.App.5th 1218, 1227 ["It is undisputed that substantial evidence exists showing . . . the parents consistently visited the children."].)
DISPOSITION
The order is affirmed.
We concur: EDMON, P. J. LAVIN, J.