In Re Adoption/Guardianship of DUSTIN R.

This case concerns whether the Court of Special Appeals erred in dismissing on its own initiative an appeal by the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (“DHMH”), Respondent, and whether the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County, sitting as a juvenile court (“the juvenile court”), had the authority to order DHMH to continue to provide services after age twenty-one to Dustin R. (“Dustin”), Petitioner, a medically fragile child who needed life-sustaining care.

We hold that: (I) the Court of Special Appeals erred in dismissing DHMH’s appeal because the juvenile court’s order was immediately…