Adoption of E.A. CA2/6

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

G.C. and F.A. are the unmarried biological parents of E.A. who was born in Santa Barbara in January 2007. M.G. is E.A.'s godmother and was mother's close friend.

1 All further unspecified statutory references are to the Probate Code. M.G. was present for E.A.'s birth and stayed at the hospital with mother and child until they were discharged. M.G. moved to Oxnard in October 2007, but continued to visit E.A. in Santa Barbara almost every day. In February 2008, E.A. began spending weekends with M.G. By June 2009, the child was spending only one weekend a month with her parents; by the following August, she was living with M.G. full-time. Father visited every two weeks and occasionally took E.A. to spend the weekend with him and mother. E.A. lived with M.G. until August 2010, when M.G. was seriously injured in a car accident. E.A. resumed living with mother and father and their second child F.A., Jr., who was born in August 2008. Only two months later, E.A. witnessed an incident of domestic violence in which father knocked mother unconscious. M.G. drove to Santa Barbara and picked up mother and both children. Mother and F.A., Jr., stayed…