Com. v. Weston W.
| Decision Date | 25 September 2009 |
| Docket Number | SJC-10299. |
| Citation | 455 Mass. 24,913 N.E.2d 832 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. WESTON W., a juvenile (and a companion case<SMALL><SUP>1</SUP></SMALL>). |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
James L. Sultan, Boston (Jonathan P. Harwell & Anna Eliot with him) for the juveniles.
Miriam S. Pappas, Assistant District Attorney (Loretta M. Lillios, Assistant District Attorney, with her) for the Commonwealth.
The following submitted briefs for amici curiae:
Laura Rotolo for American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts.
Brian W. Leahey, Assistant City Solicitor, for city of Lowell.
Cecilia Chen, Barbara Kaban, Francine Sherman, Joshua Dohan, Roxbury, Leah Rabinowitz, Ashley Lewis, & Nicole Dooley for Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund & others.
Michael Adam Burger, for David Ahl & another.
Present: MARSHALL, C.J., IRELAND, SPINA, COWIN, CORDY, BOTSFORD, & GANTS, JJ.
Around midnight on different dates, police officers in the city of Lowell (Lowell) encountered the juvenile defendants outside on the street. Each juvenile was arrested and charged with violating Lowell's "Youth Protection Curfew for Minors" (ordinance), which requires persons under the age of seventeen (minors) to be at home between 11 P.M. and 5 A.M. unless they meet one of a number of exceptions. The juvenile defendants filed motions to dismiss the complaints, arguing that the ordinance infringed on rights guaranteed by the Fourth, Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, and art. 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. In a memorandum and report prepared pursuant to Mass. R.Crim. P. 34, as amended, 442 Mass. 1501 (2004), a judge in the Juvenile Court Department reported the following questions of law to the Appeals Court:
We granted the juveniles' application for direct appellate review. We conclude that the Lowell ordinance implicates, and the Declaration of Rights protects, a fundamental right of free movement.2 Therefore, the "strict scrutiny" standard of review applies, and the Commonwealth has the burden of demonstrating that the ordinance is narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling government interest. Goodridge v. Department of Publ. Health, 440 Mass. 309, 330, 798 N.E.2d 941 (2003) (Goodridge). The juveniles concede that the government has a compelling interest in protecting minors, in crime prevention, and in promoting parental supervision and authority over minors. The remaining constitutional question, then, is whether the ordinance is narrowly tailored.
We conclude that the curfew itself is narrowly tailored to achieve its purposes. However, the criminal processes and punishments provided in the ordinance for curfew violations are not the least restrictive means of accomplishing those purposes, and contradict well-established goals of rehabilitating, not incarcerating, juvenile offenders. Consequently, they are not sufficiently tailored to meet the strict scrutiny standard. See Commonwealth v. Florence F., 429 Mass. 523, 526-527, 709 N.E.2d 418 (1999). We also conclude, however, that the civil enforcement provisions of the ordinance are sufficiently less restrictive to survive constitutional scrutiny.
1. Background. A Lowell police officer approached Weston W. outside at 12:15 A.M. on September 21, 2004. Weston informed the arresting officer that he had no identification, that he was sixteen years old, and that he lived in Somerville. He also stated that he was attempting to visit a girl who lived in Lowell. The officer placed him under arrest for violating the ordinance and transported him to the police station.
At 12:27 A.M. on October 10, 2004, responding to a report of a disturbance, officers observed a group of young people, and as the officers approached, members of the group began to flee. The officers apprehended some of the group, including Adam A., and determined that they were minors. They were similarly arrested for violating the ordinance and transported to the police station.
The parties have stipulated that the ordinance was applied criminally to both of the minors. In response to the juveniles' motions to dismiss the complaints, the judge initially held that the ordinance's criminal sanctions were unconstitutional. He subsequently stayed the dismissal order in the case so that the parties could expand the record, which they did. The judge then reported the above questions.
In his memorandum and report, the judge made a number of findings based on the submissions of the parties, including affidavits from a member of the city council of Lowell and the superintendent of police for Lowell.3 The judge found that the ordinance, which was adopted on August 9, 1994, was a response to both national and local increases in juvenile crime. At the national level between 1988 and 1992, "aggravated assault cases among juveniles increased by eighty percent, homicides by fifty-five percent, robberies by fifty-two percent, and forcible rape by twenty-seven percent." In Lowell, only nine minors were arrested for assault and battery in 1982, but 102 minors were arrested for the same crime in 1993, an increase of about 1,133%. Lowell also witnessed several violent incidents in 1994, leading to the adoption of the ordinance. Early on the morning of August 1, a sixteen year old was badly beaten by members of a rival gang at Morey Park; around 11 P.M. the night before, a gang confrontation had led to the arrest of four teenagers; and on August 3, a gang fight allegedly involving minors occurred around 10:30 P.M.
After "months of planning," the Lowell city council adopted the ordinance. The ordinance sets out a series of findings made by the council,4 followed by a statement of its purposes to:
To accomplish these purposes, the ordinance establishes curfew hours of 11 P.M. until 5 A.M., seven days a week, for minors. A minor is defined as a person under seventeen years of age. A minor "commits an offense if he/she remains, either on foot or in a vehicle, in any public place or on the premises of any establishment within the City of Lowell during youth protection curfew hours."5
There are nine exceptions to the curfew. No violation occurs if the minor is accompanied by the minor's parent or guardian; on an errand at the direction of the minor's parent or guardian; in a motor vehicle involved in interstate travel; engaged in, going to, or returning from an employment activity; involved in an emergency; on the sidewalk abutting the minor's residence; attending certain school, religious, or recreational activities; exercising rights protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution; or married and in compliance with G.L. c. 207, §§ 7 and 25 ().
If a police officer suspects that a person is violating the ordinance, the officer must first speak with the suspect.6 Then, if the officer believes a violation has occurred, he may enforce the ordinance "by arrest or by criminal complaint or by non-criminal disposition as hereinafter provided."
The ordinance then establishes the criminal and civil penalties that result from violations. Under the heading "Criminal Disposition," it provides:
Under "Noncriminal Disposition," it provides:
Finally, the ordinance includes a severability clause in the event that any portion of it should be found invalid.7
2. Discussion. We begin by responding to the second reported question: "What is the appropriate standard of review in considering an equal protection challenge to a juvenile curfew ordinance in this Commonwealth?" We then apply that standard of review to the curfew provisions at issue in this case.
a. Standard of review. All people in the Commonwealth are guaranteed the right to equal protection of the laws by the United States Constitution and the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.8 Under both Constitutions,9 "[w]here a statute implicates a fundamental right or uses a suspect classification, we employ `strict judicial scrutiny.'" Goodridge, supra, quoting Lowell v. Kowalski, 380 Mass. 663, 666, 405...
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