Jones v. Breed

• Decision Date: 15 May 1974
• Docket Number: No. 72-2644.,72-2644.
• Citation: 497 F.2d 1160
• Parties: Gary Stevens JONES, a minor, By and Through Lola Mae Jones, his guardian ad litem, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Allen F. BREED, Director of the California Youth Authority, and Robert McKibben, Superintendent of the Southern Regional Center Clinic, California Youth Authority, Respondents-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

497 F.2d 1160 (1974)

Gary Stevens JONES, a minor, By and Through Lola Mae Jones, his guardian ad litem, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Allen F. BREED, Director of the California Youth Authority, and Robert McKibben, Superintendent of the Southern Regional Center Clinic, California Youth Authority, Respondents-Appellees.

No. 72-2644.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

May 15, 1974.

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Robert L. Walker (argued), Peter Bull, San Francisco, Cal., for petitioner-appellant.

Russell Iungerich, Deputy Atty. Gen. (argued), Evelle J. Younger, Atty. Gen., Los Angeles, Cal., for respondents-appellees.

Before GOODWIN and WALLACE, Circuit Judges, and EAST,^* District Judge.

WALLACE, Circuit Judge:

Seventeen-year-old Jones was apprehended for robbery, detained and adjudicated a ward of the juvenile court. Subsequently, he was referred for trial as an adult and was convicted. Having exhausted his state remedies, he unsuccessfully applied to the district court for habeas corpus relief, claiming a violation of his Fifth Amendment right against double jeopardy. We reverse.

California does not challenge the use of habeas corpus as a proper remedy in this case, see Fain v. Duff, 488 F.2d 218 (5th Cir. 1973), or contend that Jones has not exhausted his state remedies. The sole question before us is whether jeopardy attached during the juvenile court proceedings to prevent Jones' trial as an adult.

The State of California filed a petition in the juvenile court alleging that Jones, a minor, had committed an act which, if committed by an adult, would be a violation of Cal.Penal Code § 211 (robbery). If the allegations in the petition were true, the juvenile court had jurisdiction pursuant to Cal.Welf. & Inst'ns Code § 602.¹ The juvenile court, following a preliminary hearing, ordered that Jones be detained pending a hearing on the delinquency petition.

Twenty days later, the juvenile court held the delinquency hearing² for the purpose of determining whether Jones had committed the crime alleged, whether the juvenile court had jurisdiction and whether Jones would be adjudged a ward of the court.³ Thus, for the juvenile court to proceed, the state had to prove that Jones committed the robbery. With the exception of a right to a jury trial, the delinquency hearing is in the nature of a criminal trial. See In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 365-366, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970); In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 49-51, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527 (1967). Jones and two prosecution witnesses testified at the hearing. The juvenile court found that Jones had committed the robbery and that Jones was under the jurisdiction of the juvenile court and continued the proceedings to a later date at which time the court would determine the proper disposition of Jones.⁴ At the subsequent hearing, the juvenile court judge announced he did not intend to proceed with Jones as a juvenile but intended to find him unamenable to the rehabilitative facilities of the juvenile court and to direct the District Attorney to prosecute Jones as an adult.⁵ Upon an objection by Jones that he had assumed the hearing was to determine disposition to the appropriate juvenile facility, not to determine certification to the adult court for criminal prosecution, the court granted a one-week continuance. At the next hearing, Jones objected to the certification, contending, among other things, that he had already been adjudicated a person described in Cal.Welf. & Inst'ns Code § 602⁶ by the juvenile court and, therefore, certification to be "tried" again would place him twice in jeopardy. The court rejected the argument and certified Jones to be tried as an adult.

Following an unsuccessful attempt to secure habeas corpus relief in the state courts, Jones was tried and found guilty of armed robbery and his double jeopardy argument was again rejected.

Undaunted, Jones filed a petition for habeas corpus in the district court, once more claiming double jeopardy. The district court judge denied the petition, holding that jeopardy does not attach in the juvenile proceedings and even if it had, no new jeopardy arose by the procedure of certifying Jones to be tried and ultimately convicted as an adult. Jones v. Breed, 343 F.Supp. 690 (C.D.Cal. 1972).

We must first resolve whether the protection of the Fifth Amendment "nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb . . ." applies to juvenile court proceedings.⁷ Certainly the constitutional mandate makes no distinction between adults and juveniles. See In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 13, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 16 L.Ed.2d 1013 (1967). The district court found that the nature of the juvenile court proceeding is such that it should be treated differently from adult criminal proceedings and double jeopardy restrictions should not be applied.

The juvenile court system was conceived around the turn of the century with the emergence of the enlightened concept of separating erring children from hardened felons.⁸ The primary objective of the new system was to take juvenile offenders out of adult courts and adult bastilles and provide them with a sound rehabilitation program.⁹ The system was envisioned as civil in nature rather than criminal. Traditional adversarial fact-finding procedures were abandoned in favor of informal procedures that would allow the court to determine what was in the juvenile's best interest and how he could be retrained, while at a pliable age, to live lawfully in society.¹⁰ The juvenile court judge, in his role as "father"¹¹ to the erring juvenile, was to protect his interest and welfare. Rules of evidence were abandoned and constitutional guarantees provided in adult proceedings were not afforded juveniles.¹²

Although the adoption of these informal methods was perhaps sound in principle, the complexities of our society and our overcrowded juvenile court facilities dictated some modification.¹³ In Kent v. United States, 383 U.S. 541, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84 (1966), the Court analyzed the procedure for referring a juvenile for trial as an adult. Recognizing the significant disparity of what could happen to the juvenile depending upon whether he was tried as a juvenile or as an adult, the Court was no longer willing to have the waiver of jurisdiction decision made without the due process requirements of a hearing, representation by counsel, a statement of reasons or considerations for any referral to the adult court and opportunity for the juvenile's counsel to review the child's social study records.

Kent was followed by In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 16 L.Ed.2d 1013 (1967), in which the Court mandated due process protection at the delinquency hearing by requiring (1) that the juvenile be given adequate notice of the charges, (2) that he be given the right to counsel, (3) that he be allowed to assert the privilege against self-incrimination and (4) that he be given the right to confront and cross-examine witnesses. More importantly, the Gault Court sounded a new approach to the juvenile system and rejected the theory that constitutional safeguards should be denied juveniles by the expedient of labeling the proceedings as civil when in fact they were criminal in nature. The Court reemphasized this requirement in In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970), holding that the charges against the juvenile must be proven at the delinquency hearing beyond a reasonable doubt. After Winship, if the state wished to limit constitutional rights, it inherited the burden of proving that criminal safeguards would be detrimental to particular aspects of the juvenile system.¹⁴

It was unclear, however, whether these constitutional safeguards¹⁵ included the Fifth Amendment protection against double jeopardy.¹⁶ The Supreme Court has held that not all common-law protections available to adults are available to juveniles. The Constitution does not require the total emasculation of juvenile court procedures. As Justice Blackmun stated in McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 551, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 1989, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 (1971):

If the formalities of the criminal adjudicative process are to be super-imposed upon the juvenile court system, there is little need for its separate existence. Perhaps that ultimate disillusionment will come one day, but for the moment we are disinclined to give impetus to it.

The basic approaches of the juvenile and adult adjudicative processes dictate that the systems not operate exactly alike. In McKeiver, the Court rejected the contention that a juvenile court must provide a jury trial; Justice Blackmun stated:

If the jury trial were to be injected into the juvenile court system as a matter of right, it would bring with it into that system the traditional delay, the formality, and the clamor of the adversary system and, possibly, the public trial.

403 U.S. at 550. But that case does not dictate the nonapplicability of double jeopardy. Whether a jury is required deals with the method of juvenile adjudication; whether double jeopardy applies goes to the very core of basic application of rights and does not affect how the juvenile is tried. Its only effect on procedure pertains to whether the hearing to determine whether a minor is a fit subject for the juvenile program must be held before he is adjudicated a ward of the court. Applying double jeopardy protection to juvenile proceedings will not impede the juvenile courts in carrying out their basic goal of rehabilitating the erring youth. Indeed, basic constitutional guarantees such as that against double jeopardy are so fundamental to our notions of fairness that our refusal to find them applicable to the youth may do irreparable harm to or destroy their confidence in our judicial system. Ultimately, this may be more important than our recognition of the need for special and informal procedures to rehabilitate juveniles.

A youth is entitled to double...