Lane v. Jones

• Decision Date: 02 October 1980
• Docket Number: No. 79-3179,79-3179
• Citation: 626 F.2d 1296
• Parties: Willie Charles LANE, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Thomas F. JONES, Sheriff of Glynn County, Georgia, Respondent-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 1296

626 F.2d 1296

Willie Charles LANE, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Thomas F. JONES, Sheriff of Glynn County, Georgia,

Respondent-Appellee.

No. 79-3179.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Oct. 2, 1980.

Henry C. Ross, Savannah, Ga., for petitioner-appellant.

Amanda F. Williams, Brunswick, Ga., for respondent-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia.

Before TUTTLE, VANCE and POLITZ, Circuit Judges.

VANCE, Circuit Judge:

By petition for writ of habeas corpus, filed pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, Willie Charles Lane complained that he was denied due process of law when tried for murder as an adult rather than having his case adjudicated in the juvenile court. Because we conclude that the case is controlled by this court's prior decision in Woodard v. Wainwright, 556 F.2d 781 (5th Cir. 1977), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 1088, 98 S.Ct. 1285, 55 L.Ed.2d 794 (1978) we affirm the district court's denial of the writ.

There is no factual dispute. Petitioner was born on February 13, 1963. On December 29, 1978 he was taken in custody by city police of Brunswick, Georgia. On the next day the judge of the juvenile court of Glynn County issued an order directing that petitioner be held in the juvenile section of the Glynn County Detention Center. On January 2, 1979 an arrest warrant was issued out of the magistrate's court of Glynn County charging petitioner with murder. On January 24, 1979 he was indicted by the grand jury, was subsequently tried, convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment.

Georgia law provides for a juvenile court and vests in the juvenile court exclusive jurisdiction over juveniles alleged to be delinquent, unruly or deprived, subject, however, to an exception which was applicable in petitioner's case. The jurisdictional provision pertinent to our consideration is found in Ga.Code Ann. § 24A-301(b) as follows:

(b) The (juvenile) court shall have concurrent jurisdiction with the superior court over a child who is alleged to have committed a delinquent act which would be considered a crime if tried in a superior court and for which the child may be punished by loss of life or confinement for life in the penitentiary.

The Georgia statute thus contains parallel jurisdictional provisions with jurisdiction over the petitioner properly subject to exercise by either the juvenile court or the superior court. The statute is silent as to how a selection is made between the two courts. Decisions of the Georgia Supreme Court, however, have clearly established that whichever court first takes jurisdiction retains it subject to the power of the juvenile court to transfer cases to the superior court under another specific code section. Hartley v. Clack, 239 Ga. 113, 236 S.E.2d 63 (1977); Relyea v. State, 236 Ga. 299, 223 S.E.2d 638 (1976).

When petitioner was taken into custody the public defender, acting as his counsel, sought on January 8, 1979 to quicken the jurisdiction of the juvenile court and thereby preclude assertion of the superior court's jurisdiction. To do so, he took the unusual step of presenting a petition to the juvenile court judge alleging the delinquency of his own client. ¹ Ga.Code Ann. § 24A-1601 provides, however, that

(a) petition alleging delinquency, deprivation or unruliness of a child shall not be filed unless the court or a person authorized by the court has determined and endorsed upon the petition that the filing of the petition is in the best interest of the public and the child.

The juvenile court judge refused to act under this section and thereby refused to accept and file the petition. He held no hearing on the matter. In the state habeas corpus proceeding he later testified that it was his policy not to accept jurisdiction in any capital felony case.

The Georgia Supreme Court had previously held in Hartley v. Clack that the juvenile court's prior action in issuing an order of detention did not result in that court's having taken jurisdiction of the matter. The juvenile court judge's subsequent refusal to allow filing of the petition effectively prevented the exercise of that court's jurisdiction. Consequently, when petitioner's indictment was returned and no petition was pending in the juvenile court, jurisdiction of the superior court attached. Lane v. Jones, 244 Ga. 17, 257 S.E.2d 525 (1979). The juvenile court was thereafter precluded from exercising jurisdiction under the established principles of Georgia law.

After the juvenile court judge of Glynn County refused his petition alleging delinquency and before an indictment was returned, petitioner's counsel presented a petition of habeas corpus to the judge of the superior court of Glynn County raising the issues which ultimately have come before this court. The petition for habeas corpus was denied by the Georgia superior court. In due course that ruling was upheld by the Supreme Court of Georgia, id., which held that there was neither a deprivation of due process nor an abuse of discretion involved in the juvenile court's refusal to exercise jurisdiction.

The thrust of petitioner's present contention is that the juvenile judge's arbitrary refusal without a hearing to accept the petition alleging delinquency and thereby accept jurisdiction of the case deprived him of due process of law. As a backdrop to our consideration of this contention we note that the Georgia statute does not expressly impose any duty on the juvenile court judge to conduct any such hearing or to allow such a filing. The Supreme Court of Georgia has expressly held that the judge's action in this case is consistent with the basic philosophy of Georgia law and did not constitute an abuse of discretion.

To support his due process argument, petitioner primarily relies on Kent v. United States, 383 U.S. 541, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84 (1966). Kent was a 16 year old juvenile charged with housebreaking, robbery and rape. Under the D.C.Code he was subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the District of Columbia Juvenile Court unless after full investigation that court waived jurisdiction and remitted him for trial to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. In Kent's case jurisdiction was waived by the juvenile court judge without a hearing and without any investigation. Kent attacked the waiver of jurisdiction on a number of statutory and constitutional grounds. The Supreme Court viewed the case, however, as raising "problems of substantial concern as to the construction of and compliance with the Juvenile Court Act." Id. at 551, 86 S.Ct. at 1052. The court's reading of the applicable statute, although...