Filed 4/22/22; Certified for publication 5/17/22 (order attached) COURT OF APPEAL, FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION ONE STATE OF CALIFORNIA In re M.V. et al., Persons Coming Under the Juvenile Court Law. D079473 SAN DIEGO COUNTY HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY, (Super. Ct. No. NJ15751A, B) Plaintiff and Respondent, v. J.V. et al., Defendants and Appellants; M.V., a Minor, etc., et al., Appellants. APPEALS from orders of the Superior Court of San Diego County, Michael Imhoff, Commissioner. Reversed and remanded for further proceedings. Neale B. Gold, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant J.V. 1 Valerie N. Lankford, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant M.Z. Lelah S. Fisher, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for Minors and Appellants M.V. and I.V. Lonnie J. Eldridge, County Counsel, Caitlin E. Rae, Chief Deputy County Counsel, and Lisa M. Maldonado, Deputy County Counsel, for Plaintiff and Respondent. INTRODUCTION After declaring them dependents of the court, the juvenile court removed M.V. and I.V. (together, Children) from the physical custody of their parents, J.V. (Father) and M.Z. (Mother), and placed them with a relative caregiver pending reunification efforts. Father, Mother, and the Children appeal those dispositional orders. They assert substantial evidence does not support the court’s findings, by clear and convincing evidence, that there was substantial danger to the Children if they were returned home and that there were no reasonable means to protect them without removing them from their parents’ custody. On the record before us, we agree. Accordingly, we reverse the dispositional orders as to both Father and Mother. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND I. Dependency Proceedings Before the Children’s Removal Father and Mother had been together for about five years when dependency proceedings were initiated in June 2021. Later that same month, they married. They have two children, M.V. and I.V., who were at the relevant time three and two years old, respectively. Father also has joint custody of his six-year-old son, A.V., from a previous relationship. The family 2 lived in “an RV” or a “small[,] manufactured trailer” on a nursery lot, where Father worked. The family came to the attention of the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency (Agency) on December 11, 2020, when Mother was arrested after law enforcement determined she was the “domina[nt] aggressor” in a physical altercation with Father. Father, who had called 911, told the deputies Mother became angry, threw a coffee cup at him, cutting his wrist, broke the window of their family truck, and punched herself in the face.1 Mother told the deputies that Father threw shoes at her, struck her face with his hand, knocked the television to the ground and, although she did not see him do it, she heard Father break the window of the truck. Mother also reported that Father struck then one-year-old I.V. in the face. When the deputies spoke with then five-year-old A.V., the child said he saw Mother throw a coffee cup at Father and Father bleeding; …
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