Bible v. State

• Decision Date: 16 January 1970
• Docket Number: No. 469S82,469S82
• Citation: 253 Ind. 373,254 N.E.2d 319
• Parties: Peter Andrew BIBLE and John Phillip Grundy, alias Bible, Appellants, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee.
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

Page 319

254 N.E.2d 319

253 Ind. 373

Peter Andrew BIBLE and John Phillip Grundy, alias Bible, Appellants, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee.

No. 469S82.

Supreme Court of Indiana.

Jan. 16, 1970.

George E. Sawyer, John L. Rybolt, John Preston Ward, Indianapolis, for appellants.

Theodore L. Sendak, Atty. Gen., Robert F. Hassett, Deputy Atty. Gen., for appellee.

HUNTER, Chief Justice.

This is an appeal from a hearing on a petition in the Marion County Juvenile Court in which appellants, Peter Andrew Bible and John Phillip Grundy, ages 15 and 13 respectively, were determined to be delinquents pursuant to Ind.Ann.Stat. § 9--3204 (1969 Supp.):

"Delinquent child' defined.--The words 'delinquent child' shall include any boy under the full age of eighteen (18) years and any girl under the full age of eighteen (18) years who:

(1) Commits an act which, if committed by an adult, would be a crime not punishable by death or life imprisonment; * * *.'

The act allegedly committed by each of the appellants was assault and battery, to-wit: 'Did then and there unlawfully in a rude, insolent and angry manner beat and strike one Alvis Light W/M/51 of 1502 E. 17th (St.) then and there being contrary to the statute provided and against the peace and dignity of Indiana.' Under Ind.Ann.Stat. § 10--403 (1956 Repl.), assault and battery is a crime which, if committed by an adult, would not be punishable by death or life imprisonment.

Accordingly, upon a finding that the appellants had committed the acts as charged, the court made the following orders: (1) that Peter Andrew Bible be placed on probation under standard conditions, and (2) that John Phillip Grundy be ordered continued on suspended commitment to the Indiana Boys' School.

Prior to the above proceedings, appellants had filed a motion asking for a trial by jury at their delinquency hearing. These motions were overruled by the judge of the juvenile court in consonance with Ind.Ann.Stat. § 9--3215 (1969 Supp.) which provides in part that:

'* * * All cases for the determination of a petition requesting that a person be determined to be a delinquent or dependent or neglected child shall be heard separately and apart from the trial of cases against adults, and the court shall hear and determine such cases without a jury: * * *.' (our emphasis)

Appellants then filed motions for a new trial alleging as error the court's overruling of their motions for a jury trial. The trial court overruled said motions for a new trial, whereupon appellants took a consolidated appeal to the Appellate Court. That appeal, upon petition by the appellee, State of Indiana, was transferred to this court because of the constitutional issue raised therein.

The sole question presented by the appellants' appeal is this: Does a juvenile have a constitutional right to a trial by jury in juvenile proceedings? Recognizing the importance of the question both to Indiana and to our sister states, and further, being very much aware of the rapidity of change in the area of juvenile rights ¹ brought about by recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions (discussed below), this court felt it wise to look to that court for guidance in deciding this case.

On November 12, 1969, the U.S. Supreme Court in a per curiam opinion, decided the case of DeBacker v. Brainard (1969), 396 U.S. 28, 90 S.Ct. 163, 24 L.Ed.2d 148. In that case the appellant, who was found to be a delinquent child under Neb.Rev.Stat. § 43--201(4), asked the court to decide whether the Fourteenth and Sixth Amendments, in light of the court's decisions in Duncan v. Louisiana (1968), 391 U.S. 145, 88 S.Ct. 1444, 20 L.Ed.2d 491; Bloom v. Illinois (1968), 391 U.S. 194, 88 S.Ct. 1477, 20 L.Ed.2d 522, and In re Gault (1967), 387 U.S. 1, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527, require a trial by jury in a state juvenile court proceeding based on an alleged act of juvenile delinquency which, if committed by an adult, would amount to a serious crime under the Duncan and Bloom cases and require a jury trial if requested.

Although the question in DeBacker is precisely the same as the one in the case at bar, the U.S. Supreme Court did not feel obliged to dispose of it. Quoting from their opinion, they said:

'In DeStefano v. Woods, 392 U.S. 631, 88 S.Ct. 2093, 20 L.Ed.2d 1308, we held that Duncan and Bloom 'should receive only prospective application' and stated that we would 'not reverse state convictions for failure to grant jury trial where trials began prior to May 20, 1968, the date of this Court's decisions in Duncan v. Louisiana and Bloom v. Illinois.' 392 U.S., at 633, 635, 88 S.Ct. at 2095, 20 L.Ed.2d at 1311, 1312. Because appellant's juvenile court hearing was held on March 28, 1968--prior to the date of the decisions in Duncan and Bloom--appellant would have had no constitutional right to a trial by jury if he had been tried as an adult in a criminal proceeding. It thus seems manifest that this case is not an appropriate one for considering whether the Nebraska statute which provides that juvenile hearings are 'without a jury,' Neb.Rev.Stat. § 43--206.03(2), is constitutionally invalid in light of Duncan and Bloom.' 396 U.S. at 30, 90 S.Ct. at 164, 24 L.Ed.2d at 152.

Therefore, since no position was taken by the U.S. Supreme Court in this matter, it is apparent that this court must decide the question on the basis of our own judicial examination of the various cases, statutes, and constitutional principles pertinent thereto.

First it should be recognized that there was no special judicial system for juveniles at common law. Prior to the enactment of the various juvenile codes in the United States, most jurisdictions treated juveniles as adults in criminal proceedings and accorded them all of the privileges and rights as such. Among the rights thus extended and constitutionally recognized was the right to trial by jury.

Around the turn of this century, beginning with Illinois in 1899, a separate system of courts and procedures began to appear. As Mr. Justice Fortas noted in the landmark case of In re Gault, supra:

'The early reformers were appalled by adult procedures and penalties, and by the fact that children could be given long prison sentences and mixed in jails with hardened criminals. They were profoundly convinced that society's duty to the child could not be confined by the concept of justice alone. They believed that society's role was not to ascertain whether the child was 'guilty' or 'innocent,' but 'What is he, how has he become what he is, and what had best be done in his interest and in the interest of the state to save him from a downward career.' The child--essentially good, as they saw it--was to be made 'to feel that he is the object of (the state's) care and solicitude,' not that he was under arrest or on trial. The rules of criminal procedure were therefore altogether inapplicable. The apparent rigidities, technicalities, and harshness which they observed in both substantive and procedural criminal law were therefore to be discarded. The idea of crime and punishment was to be abandoned. The child was to be 'treated' and 'rehabilitated' and the procedures, from apprehension through institutionalization, were to be 'clinical' rather than punitive.

These results were to be achieved, without coming to conceptual and constitutional grief, by insisting that the proceedings were not adversary, but that the state was proceeding as parens patriae.' 387 U.S. at 15, 16, 87 S.Ct. at 1437, 18 L.Ed.2d at 539, 540.

It was in that spirit that Indiana in 1903, created its first juvenile code, Acts 1903, ch. 237. Its rationale presently appears in the following quote from Ind.Ann.Stat. § 9--3201 (1956 Repl.)

'Purpose and basis principle--The purpose of this act (§§ 9--3201--9--3225) is to secure for each child within its provisions such care, guidance and control, preferably in his own home, as will serve the child's welfare and the best interests of the state; and when such child is removed from his own family, to secure for him custody, care and discipline as nearly as possible equivalent to that which should have been given by his parents.

The principle is hereby recognized that children under the jurisdiction of the court are subject to the discipline and entitled to the protection of the state, which may intervene to safeguard them from neglect or injury and to enforce the legal obligations due to them and from them.'

Because the juvenile proceeding was deemed to be non-criminal in nature the strict procedural requirements of criminal trials were not deemed appropriate nor desirable. In the case of In re Adams v. State (1963), 244 Ind. 460, 465, 193 N.E.2d 362, 364, this court noted that:

'Legislation dealing with juvenile courts and juvenile delinquency is the result of solicitude of the law for the welfare of the infant. Juvenile courts are generally considered to exercise a parental supervision over delinquent and neglected children as parens patriae. Such courts assume jurisdiction over juvenile delinquents for their protection, care and custody. Standing in loco parentis, they may exercise a supervision of delinquent children and may properly restrain their liberty in the exercise of discipline, rehabilitation and training. They are in a different group from that of adults, and the constitutional guaranties with reference to criminal procedure applying in the case of adults do not have the same application to infants by reason of the nature of the parental supervision necessary for their training, care and discipline.'

Although Indiana's original Juvenile Code of 1903 granted trial by jury at the request of the juvenile (as did Acts 1941 ch. 233, § 13), the Indiana General Assembly enacted certain amendments in 1945, one of which contained a provision that expressly denied the right at juvenile hearings. That provision has continued in force in our statutes and has been set out above, § 9--3215, supra. It should be noted at this point...