If a child is not in placement, a court must hold a trial within six months of the authorization of the petition unless it adjourns the trial for good cause under MCR 3.923(G). MCR 3.972(A).
If a child is in placement, the court must hold a trial “as soon as possible, but not later than 63 days after the child is removed from the home unless the trial is postponed:
(1) on stipulation of the parties for good cause;
(2) because process cannot be completed; or
(3) because the court finds that the testimony of a presently unavailable witness is needed.” MCR 3.972(A).
If a trial is postponed because the process cannot be completed or because the testimony of an unavailable witness is necessary, the court must “release the child to the [child’s] parent, guardian, or legal custodian unless the court finds that releasing the child to the custody of the parent, guardian, or legal custodian will likely result in physical harm or serious emotional damage to the child.” MCR 3.972(A).
In child protective proceedings, adjourning a trial or hearing should only be granted for good cause after the court takes the child’s best interests into consideration. MCR 3.923(G). The adjournment must be “for as short a period of time as possible.”1 Id. In order for a court to find good cause, “‘a legally sufficient or substantial reason’ must first be shown.” In re Utrera, 281 Mich App 1, 10-12 (2008) (although the court erred by failing to find good cause or consider the child’s best interests to support its multiple adjournments, reversal was not required when the respondent-mother contributed to the adjournments on several occasions and failed to show how she was prejudiced by them).
The court’s refusal to adjourn a child protective proceeding pending the outcome of a related criminal proceeding that arose out of the same factual circumstances did not violate the appellant-parents’ Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination. In re Stricklin, 148 Mich App 659, 664-665 (1986) (finding that an “accept[ance of the] appellant[-parents’] premise that the increased risk of loss of parental rights was the penalty imposed upon them for their refusal to testify [at the child protective proceeding], it must be concluded that the testimony sought through such compulsion would have been nonincriminating[, and t]he compulsion of nonincriminating testimony is not the sort of compulsion contemplated by the Fifth Amendment.”).2
“If the child has been removed from the home, a review hearing must be held within 182 days of the date of the child’s removal from the home, even if the trial has not been completed before the expiration of that 182-day period.” MCR 3.972(A).
MCR 3.973(B), which governs notice of dispositional hearings, contemplates a combined adjudicative and dispositional hearing: “[u]nless the dispositional hearing is held immediately after the trial, notice of hearing may be given by scheduling it on the record in the presence of the parties or in accordance with MCR 3.920.” MCR 3.973(C) assigns to the court’s discretion the interval between the trial and the dispositional hearing (not to exceed 28 days except for good cause, when a child is in placement). Accordingly, the two hearings may be combined if necessary preparations are made before the hearing, including preparation of a case service plan.3 MCL 712A.18f(2). See also MCR 3.973(E)(2).
1 See Section 7.1(B) for a detailed discussion of adjourning preliminary hearings.
2 In In re Stricklin, 148 Mich App at 664-665, the Court also found that “[b]ecause of the essential similarity of issues in the [child protective proceeding and the related criminal proceeding], any incriminating testimony offered at the criminal proceeding would have also been incriminating at the [child protective] proceeding[,]” and that “[a]ny adverse consequences resulting from [the] appellant[-parents’] failure to testify [during the child protective proceeding] cannot be said to have been created by the state[, but rather a]ny penalty resulting from [the] appellant[-parents’] failure to testify [during the child protective proceeding] was no more than the ‘penalty’ that any party suffers when he [or she] decides not to testify in his [or her] own defense.”
3 See Section 13.6 for a detailed discussion of case service plans.