Even though the parents and the child at the center of a welfare case had all left Colorado at the time of the decision, the state Supreme Court on Monday agreed that an El Paso County judge retained the ability to terminate the parents’ legal rights over their daughter.

The justices concluded that based on the specific facts of the case – most notably, the fact that no other state had attempted to claim jurisdiction over the child, E.W. – Colorado’s initial ability to hear the case extended even after everyone had departed for Montana.

“The parents argue that, if a Montana court were to assert jurisdiction over E.W. today, Montana would be the child’s home state for purposes of that proceeding,” wrote Justice Melissa Hart in the Nov. 7 opinion. But that was “beside the point. No proceeding has been commenced in a Montana court, and there is no suggestion that Montana is seeking to assert jurisdiction.”

The legal question implicated the Uniform Child-Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act, which all states but Massachusetts have adopted. The purpose of the law was to clarify which state has jurisdiction in a custody case and prevent children from being shuttled between states in response to competing court orders.

El Paso County became involved with E.W.’s family after a domestic violence incident in September 2018, when E.W. was less than one year old. A caseworker later returned to find the parents intoxicated and E.W. with methamphetamine in her system.

A judge deemed E.W. neglected and placed her in foster care. E.W.’s father requested she be sent to Montana, where family or friends could care for her. El Paso County located a suitable placement and the judge signed off on the arrangement.

Eventually, the father and mother also moved to Montana. While there, they continued to struggle with their treatment plans, which led the El Paso County judge to terminate their parental rights in July 2020.

The parents appealed the decision, arguing the judge lost jurisdiction over E.W. after the parties had left the state. The Court of Appeals last year conceded that the UCCJEA terminates Colorado’s jurisdiction when a child and their parents no longer have a “significant connection” to or reside in the state.

However, the purpose of the UCCJEA was to prevent jurisdictional disputes between states handling custody matters, the appeals court explained. Here, no other state was attempting to wrest control of E.W.’s case away from Colorado.

“In other words, this was not a case where the Colorado court and the Montana court were trying to simultaneously exercise jurisdiction with regard to the child,” wrote Judge Craig R. Welling.

The Supreme Court agreed the El Paso County judge was not required to give up jurisdiction over E.W.’s welfare case without another state seeking to step in.

“The notion that the Colorado court, having initially obtained jurisdiction under the UCCJEA, would simply lose that jurisdiction when no other state claimed jurisdiction, is untenable,” Hart elaborated. “It would leave the child, now adjudicated dependent and neglected, subject to no court’s jurisdiction.”

Hart added that another legal framework, the Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children, also supported that conclusion.

The case is People in the Interest of E.W.