In re State ex rel. A.J., 2009-KA-0477.
| Citation | 27 So.3d 247 |
| Decision Date | 01 December 2009 |
| Docket Number | No. 2009-KA-0477.,2009-KA-0477. |
| Parties | STATE in the Interest of A.J. |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
Orleans Public Defenders, Joshua A. Perry; Juvenile Regional Services, Ilona Prieto Picou, Cheri J. Deatsch; Tulane Juvenile Law Clinic, David R. Katner, Director, Kesana A. Branford, Wesley A. Garten, Richard J. Lockett, Jr., Student Attorneys, for appellee.
Jennifer Ancona Semko, for amicus curiae, National Juvenile Defender Center and Juvenile Law Center.
Pursuant to Article V, Section 5(D)(1) of the Louisiana Constitution, this is a direct appeal of an Orleans Parish Juvenile Court judgment declaring that Article 882 of the Louisiana Children's Code, which denies juveniles the right to a jury trial in juvenile adjudications, violates the United States and Louisiana Constitutions where the juvenile is subject to a potential deprivation of liberty of more than six months. After reviewing the record and the applicable law, we reverse the juvenile court's ruling.
On April 15, 2008, the state filed a petition to commence a delinquency proceeding in Orleans Parish Juvenile Court, alleging that A.J., age fourteen, committed six felony-grade delinquent acts, i.e., six aggravated rapes, upon his five and seven-year-old siblings, in the interval between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2007.1
On May 7, 2008, A.J. moved for a jury trial.2 The juvenile court judge asked for supplemental briefing on the following:
(1) Under a federal due process fundamental fairness analysis, does a juvenile have a 14th Amendment right to a jury trial?
(2) Under a federal minimum scrutiny equal protection analysis of the 14th Amendment, does a juvenile have a right to a jury trial?
(3) Under the Louisiana constitution's due process clause in Art. I, sec. 2, using the four part test from In re C.B.[, 97-2783 (La.3/4/98), 708 So.2d 391] outlined above (but not limited to same), does a juvenile have a right to a jury trial?
(4) Under the Louisiana constitution's equal protection clause in Art. I, sec. 3, using the test as outlined in Sibley[ v. Bd. of Supervisors, 477 So.2d 1094 (La. 1985) (on reh'g)] in regard to age classifications, the state must show:
1. What is the state purpose of the age classification found in Ch.C. Art. 882; and
2. How is that purpose substantially related to the statute's age-based classification.
A.J. responded as follows. First, he contended that, although the plurality in McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 (1971) (), stopped short of extending the right to a jury trial to juveniles, McKeiver left open the possibility that the Court would extend the right in the future if the line between delinquency proceedings and adult criminal prosecutions became sufficiently blurred. The instant proceedings, A.J. argued, would be sufficiently like an adult prosecution because they would be public and the penalty would be severe.3 Second, A.J. briefly asserted that there was no rational basis for denying juveniles the right to a jury trial and thus La.Ch.C. arts. 808 and 882 violated the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Third, A.J. contended that juvenile delinquency proceedings that might result in confinement for more than six months are fundamentally unfair in the absence of a jury and therefore those juveniles are denied the due process to which they are entitled by La. Const. Art. 1, § 2. Fourth, A.J. briefly asserted that differentiating between a juvenile and an adult (who are both accused of aggravated rape) with regards to the right to a jury is an age-related classification that does not substantially further an appropriate governmental purpose and is therefore prohibited by La. Const. Art. 1, § 3.
The state argued that A.J. had offered no basis to overturn settled law. First, the state noted that the Supreme Court in McKeiver and this Court in State ex rel. D.J., 01-2149 (La.5/14/02), 817 So.2d 26, rejected the claim that juvenile delinquency adjudications were fundamentally unfair because the proceedings are conducted without a jury. Second, the state asserted that equal protection challenges to similar statutory provisions have failed in other jurisdictions, and the state contended that La.Ch.C. art. 882 passes the minimal rational-basis scrutiny that is applicable under federal equal protection jurisprudence. Third, the state applied the analysis from In re C.B. to conclude that the enactment also does not deny the movant due process under the state constitution. Fourth, the state contended that the age classification at issue ensures that juveniles "receive proper care and rehabilitation" and assures that they not be "exposed to the adult penal system," and thus substantially furthers the appropriate governmental purposes of "rehabilitation and well-being."
The juvenile court judge granted A.J.'s motion for a jury trial on January 20, 2009, and issued extensive reasons for judgment in 83 pages. At the outset, the juvenile court judge revealed frustration with the status quo in this area of law:
After ten years on the juvenile bench, this court cannot continue to indulge the legal fictions of juvenile court: that jail does not mean jail, that juvenile crime is not really crime; that a proceeding that uses armed guards and shackles is actually civil; or that liberty means one thing for adults and something else for juveniles. Who are we trying to convince? The juvenile? The victim? These fictions have only one purpose: to rationalize not applying the United States and Louisiana Constitutions as written. To this court, constitutional rights should not fall to legal fictions.
Based on centuries of Anglo-American common law tradition, basic concepts of fairness, and the words of the federal and state constitutions, this court is of the opinion that a juvenile cannot be constitutionally deprived of liberty for more than six months, without the right to a jury trial.
Regarding A.J.'s federal due process claim, the juvenile court judge criticized McKeiver for framing the issue as a false dichotomous choice between rehabilitative juvenile proceedings and the right to a jury trial, and the juvenile court distinguished McKeiver on the nature of the delinquent acts alleged4 as well as the structure of juvenile adjudications in Louisiana today,5 before ultimately construing the holding of McKeiver narrowly as neither compelling nor prohibiting jury trials in juvenile proceedings.
With this backdrop, the juvenile court scrutinized the terms used in the Children's Code and Code of Criminal Procedure before concluding that a delinquency adjudication is equivalent to a criminal prosecution for purposes of the Sixth Amendment, and that the Sixth Amendment () requires a jury trial if a juvenile is to be deprived of liberty for more than six months. Regarding the movant's federal equal protection claim, the juvenile court rejected the state's justifications for distinguishing between juveniles and adults with regard to the right to a jury trial (i.e., "to provide a court system for juveniles that provides treatment and rehabilitation and to protect the juvenile from incarceration at hard labor for a lengthy sentence or possibly for life in the adult criminal justice system"), and instead concluded that there was no rational basis for denying a jury trial to a juvenile who faces a substantial deprivation of liberty. Regarding the movant's state due process claim, the juvenile court applied a three-part test6 to find that: (1) jury trials were permitted to children as young as eight during some historical periods of the common law; (2) the flexibility, informality, and speed of juvenile adjudications would not be negatively impacted by jury trials;7 and (3) the right to a jury trial is fundamental and the link between the withholding of that right and any putative benefits is tenuous. With regard to the movant's state equal protection claim, the juvenile court found that La.Ch.C. art. 882 classifies persons on the basis of age without substantially furthering an appropriate governmental purpose.8 Therefore, the juvenile court granted the motion for a jury trial:
When the potential penalty for criminal conduct is deprivation of liberty in excess of six months, the choice of a judge or a jury is a decision that our Anglo-American common law tradition has placed in the hands of the defendant and the defendant alone. The U.S. Constitution's Sixth Amendment and Art. I, Sec. 17 of the Louisiana Constitution, as written, guarantee the right to a jury trial: both provisions extend to all persons and on their face make no distinction on the basis of age. However, due solely to the historical anomaly of juvenile court theory, those rights are not applied as written to juveniles. The result of a delinquency adjudication can be a constitutional deprivation of liberty; as such, the right to a jury trial should be applied as written in both constitutions, to proceedings that place liberty in jeopardy for more than six months, without an age-based exception.
The state objected to the juvenile court's ruling at the hearing on January 28, 2009, and filed its motion for appeal on January 30, 2009. In brief to this Court, the state contends that the juvenile court erred both in granting the motion for a jury trial and in declaring that La.Ch.C. art. 882 violates the state and federal constitutions.
The Children's Code articles at issue provide:
Art. 808. Constitutional rights of accused delinquents.
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