In Re Texas Department of Family & Protective Services

OPINION

BILL MEIER, Justice.

I. INTRODUCTION

Relator Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (TDFPS) filed a petition for writ of mandamus requesting this court to order the associate judge and the county court at law judge (1) to vacate the June 10, 2011 order for a monitored return of M.P., a child, to his mother and (2) to issue a ruling by a certain date in the final bench trial involving the termination of the parent-child relationship between M.P. and his parents. We will conditionally grant the petition in part and deny the petition in part.

II. BACKGROUND

On September 10, 2009,…