A lawyer who contends a recent state Court of Appeals ruling will have a "huge negative impact" on adoptions in New Mexico said Friday that he will appeal it to the state Supreme Court.
The ruling was issued in what the Court of Appeals described as an "emotionally fraught and difficult case" in which an Albuquerque father who says he never knew about his ex-girlfriend's pregnancy is trying to get custody of his 21/2-year-old son.
The Court of Appeals restored Mark Huddleston's parental rights and sent the case back to a District Court in Valencia County to decide who should have custody -- Huddleston or the prospective adoptive parents who have had the boy since he was 3 days old.
The adoptive parents' lawyer, Harold Atencio, said he will ask the Court of Appeals to reconsider its decision.
Atencio refused to discuss any particulars of the case, citing confidentiality rules. But he said the ruling could result in more last-minute disruption of adoptions, making birth mothers less willing to place children for adoption and heightening the risk for adoptive parents. "It's really bad for adoption in New Mexico, period," Atencio said.
Huddleston testified he didn't know of the child's existence until the adoption agency notified him about two months after the boy's birth. But that conflicted with testimony from the mother and one of her co-workers.
The District Court concluded Huddleston "knew or should have known" he had fathered a child, and the Court of Appeals agreed the evidence "supported this finding."
Huddleston met with the adoption agency the day after he was notified of the pending adoption petition and then registered with the state's putative father registry and filed a paternity suit. He contended that gave him the status of an "acknowledged father" from whom consent for adoption is required.
The adoptive parents argued he didn't take those steps soon enough, that he had to do it before the child was placed for adoption. But the Court of Appeals disagreed, saying New Mexico law doesn't contain time limits, and "there is simply no such deadline" in the statutes.
Atencio said if that ruling stands, it opens the door for last-minute claims by fathers right up until the time an adoption is finalized.
The Court of Appeals also overturned the District Court's finding that Huddleston's parental rights should be terminated based on a "presumption of abandonment" because of disintegration of the parent-child relationship.
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