In Re Michele C.

64 Cal.App.3d 818 (1976) 135 Cal. Rptr. 17 In re MICHELE C., a Minor.

STATE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, Petitioner and Respondent,

v.

FRANK WESLEY CLAY, Objector and Appellant.

Docket No. 38413. Court of Appeals of California, First District, Division One.

December 14, 1976. [819] COUNSEL

Leslie R. Perry, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, and McCarthy & Perry for Objector and Appellant.

James P. Botz, County Counsel, and Richard W. Ergo, Deputy County Counsel, for Petitioner and Respondent.

[820] OPINION

ELKINGTON, J.

The California State Department of Health petitioned the superior court to have one Michele C., a minor, declared free from the custody and control of her parents following her father's conviction of the murder, second degree, of her half sister and her mother's conviction of being an accessory (Pen. Code, § 32) to the murder. Apparently by agreement, the minor was adjudged free from the custody and control of her mother, and the action continued against her father. Following an appropriate trial the superior court adjudged that: "Michele ... a minor person, is hereby declared and adjudged to be free from the parental custody and control of her father, ..."

The father (hereafter "appellant") alone has appealed.

Uncontroverted evidence established the facts which we shall now relate.

The mother of Michele had two children of a prior marriage, Kenneth, aged five, and Kelly, aged two and a half. Following her marriage to appellant he had "engaged in unreasonably and unnecessarily cruel and brutal treatment of Kelly ... and Kenneth ... in that [he] severely beat these children with his belt and with his hands and fists so as to raise severe bruises and welts on the bodies of these children; on numerous occasions he caused each of these children to stand in a corner for long periods of time, sometimes several hours in duration; on occasion he caused each of these children to sleep without bedding on the bare floor, in some instances for periods in excess of one night; and he subjected these children to showers under cold tap water, sometimes lasting as long as 20 or 30 minutes in duration."