In re Emilia M.

Syllabus

The respondent mother appealed following the trial court's judgments termi- nating her parental rights with respect to her minor children and denying her motion to permanently transfer legal guardianship of the children to their maternal grandmother, which the court had consolidated with the trial on the termination of parental rights petitions filed by the petitioner, the Commissioner of Children and Families. The mother's sole, unpreserved claim on appeal was that the court's failure to inquire into an alleged conflict of interest involving the attorney who represented the children at trial denied the children their federal and state due process rights to conflict free counsel and that the alleged conflict impacted the court's decision to deny her motion to transfer guardianship. Held: This court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the respondent mother's appeal, as she did not have standing to challenge the denial of her motion to permanently transfer guardianship of the children because, once her parental rights had been terminated, which she did not challenge on appeal, she no longer had a specific, personal and legal interest in the children that was specially and injuriously affected by the denial of her motion, and, thus, she was not aggrieved by the denial of the motion. Argued June 5—officially released June 30, 2025