In Re Vincent M.

Appellants Paz M. (mother) and Vincent M., Sr. (father) are the parents of Vincent M., Jr. (Vincent). Two-year-old Vincent was detained in July 2004. At that time, he was living with mother in a residential substance abuse treatment program in which she was participating. Father was in prison, where he had been throughout Vincent's life. Mother immediately notified the Santa Cruz County Human Resources Agency (the Agency) of her Sioux and Chippewa Indian heritage and provided her tribal enrollment number. The juvenile court took jurisdiction over Vincent, removed Vincent from mother's custody, denied mother reunification services based on her prior failures to reunify with her other seven children, and granted father reunification services.

Both parents appealed from the dispositional order and, among other things, attacked the adequacy of the Agency's compliance with the notice provisions of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). This court reversed the juvenile court's order solely due to lack of compliance with the ICWA's notice requirements and remanded for compliance with those requirements. After remittitur, with a Welfare and Institutions Code section [1] 366.26…