Opinion
June 12, 1995
Appeal from the Family Court, Kings County (Dabiri, J.).
Ordered that the orders of disposition are affirmed, without costs or disbursements.
We agree with the Family Court that the presentment agency demonstrated by clear and convincing evidence that the mother was, by reason of mental illness, unable to provide proper and adequate care for her children at the time of the hearing, and would be unable to do so for the foreseeable future (see, Social Services Law § 384-b [c]; Matter of Hime Y., 52 N.Y.2d 242). After interviewing the mother and reviewing the mother's medical records, which included a history of frequently-repeated hospitalizations for psychotic episodes within an eight-year period, both the court-appointed psychiatrist and the psychiatrist from the presentment agency testified that the mother suffers from chronic paranoid schizophrenia. Both psychiatrists also testified that it was unlikely that the mother would continue to regularly take her medication given her failure to take the medication in the past. Further, both psychiatrists testified that the mother refused to participate in psychotherapy. Finally, both psychiatrists unequivocally stated that the mother could not adequately care for her children then or in the foreseeable future. This testimony, together with that of an agency caseworker and the documentary evidence, was clearly sufficient to support the Family Court's findings (see, Matter of Pauline Y., 193 A.D.2d 686; Matter of Norma Jean H., 179 A.D.2d 759; Matter of Sunja S., 175 A.D.2d 132). Copertino, J.P., Santucci, Altman and Krausman, JJ., concur.