Under Colorado law, a grandparent is a person “who is the parent of a child’s father or mother.” On Tuesday, members of the Colorado Supreme Court heard the argument that the word “is” is crucial to understanding what should happen when the mother and father are no longer alive.

“Under the plain definition, you say ‘Who are the parents?’ And whether it’s strangers to the children or whether it’s some blood relationship, two new parents are now the children’s father and mother,” said attorney Sean Connelly. “And in the eyes of the law, that dissolves the legal relationship, and a maternal or paternal grandparent is no longer a legal grandparent.”

The dispute over the status of grandparents stems from the deaths of Brandon and Amanda Sullivan in their Delta County home in April 2020. They left behind three young children. Authorities deemed it a murder-suicide.

A judge appointed the children’s maternal grandparents, Suzanne Nicolas and August Nicolas, as the permanent guardians, while allowing the paternal grandparents to visit. In October 2021, the Nicolases adopted the children. The paternal grandparents, Jayne Mecque Sullivan and Daniel Francis Sullivan, then petitioned for ongoing visitations, and the judge set a schedule.

However, Connelly, representing the Nicolases, told the Supreme Court there are “profound disagreements” between the two sets of grandparents stemming from the slaying. Consequently, they have sought to overturn the trial judge’s visitation order for the Sullivans. As their legal argument, the Nicolases maintain they are now the children’s parents and the Sullivans, not being their parents, no longer fall under the definition of “grandparents.”

Some members of the court were skeptical of that reasoning.

“The statute doesn’t say the child’s ‘legal’ father or mother, but it seems like your interpretation inserts that word,” Chief Justice Monica M. Márquez told Connelly. “It seems like your whole interpretation hinges on the premise that when it refers to the child’s father and mother, the statute is referring only to the child’s legal father and mother, not the child’s biological father and mother.”

However, Justice Brian D. Boatright suggested such distinctions did not matter.

“The Nicolases are the parents. Why does there need to a qualifier of ‘current’ or ‘legal?'” he wondered. “I feel like we’re creating a second-class parenting regimen by saying it has to say ‘legal.’ I mean, they’re the parents.”

The dispute over the Sullivans’ right to seek visitation also implicates a section of the Colorado Children’s Code laying out when grandparents may seek visitation rights in cases touching on custody and parental responsibilities. 

On the one hand, grandparents may pursue visitation when the child’s parent has died. They may also do so when the child is living with another party, “excluding any child who has been placed for adoption or whose adoption has been legally finalized.” For the Nicolas-Sullivan case, those provisions appeared mutually exclusive.

As a result, the Nicolases argued grandparent visitation was a non-starter because the children were already adopted, while the Sullivans suggested the death-of-a-parent provision was the one that applied to their case.

Previously, a three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals sided with the Sullivans, concluding grandparent visitation rights are not “automatically cut off” whenever a grandchild is adopted.

The Sullivans “fall within the definition of grandparents, regardless of when they filed their petition for grandparent visitation,” wrote Judge W. Eric Kuhn.

Attorney Timothy J. Eirich, representing the Sullivans, told the Supreme Court that he believed the exclusion of grandparent visitations after a child has been adopted was not likely intended for the scenario where one set of grandparents does the adopting.

“I serve as general counsel for eight different adoption agencies and this is where I’ve seen this language be addressed,” he said.

Eirich added that during the history of the case, there was always an understanding the Sullivans could visit their grandchildren. He said allowing his clients to seek visitation would not undermine the constitutional rights afforded to the Nicolases as the children’s new parents.

“If we prevail here,” Eirich said, “I anticipate the Nicolases are going to go back to the trial court and they’re going to file a motion to terminate grandparent visitation, arguing it’s no longer in the children’s best interest.”

Justice Richard L. Gabriel asked about a situation in which two parents die in a car accident and a family friend adopts the children.

“In your view, all the grandparents would be out of luck. They’d be out of those children’s lives,” he told Connelly.

“I would hope that in an ideal world, people would say, ‘We want the grandparents still involved in their lives,'” Connelly said. 

“I think your answer has to be ‘yes,'” interjected Justice Maria E. Berkenkotter, that the grandparents could no longer legally seek visitation.

Yes, that is what would happen, Connelly said.

The case is In re the Parental Responsibilities of K.M.S. et al.