Virginia's Court of Appeals reversed and remanded the denial of a stepparent adoption in Graves v. Jones, 5/9/17. The trial court erred in requiring proof that a continuing relationship with the father would be detrimental to the child, because that requirement had been removed from Code § 63.2-1205. The factors that had been listed as part of that determination were moved to become part of the determination of the child's best interests. It also erred by finding that Code § 63.2-1202(H), which says a parent's consent is not required if he has not contacted the child for six months without just cause, does not apply to stepparent adoptions.
The trial court's order said that the DSS's report "did not investigate factors relevant to determining whether consent of the birth parent is withheld contrary to the best interest of the child." It was not error for the trial court to say that, the appeals court says. However, the DSS was not required to have done so. Code § 63.2-1241(C) only says that the court may order the DSS to do that, and in this case the court had not ordered that. So while the appeals court rejects this assignment of error, it corrects the trial court to the extent that it considered the DSS's omission as a reason to deny the adoption.
On the trial court's finding that the petitioners had not proven that consent was withheld contrary to the best interests of the child, the appeals court said it could not determine from the record what the trial court's findings were on the specific factors that § 63.2-1205 requires it to consider in making that determination. It remands for that.