State v. B. Y. (In re B. Y.)

• Decision Date: 20 April 2022
• Docket Number: A172581
• Citation: 319 Or.App. 208,510 P.3d 247
• Parties: In the MATTER OF B. Y., a Youth. State of Oregon, Respondent, v. B. Y., Appellant.
• Court: Oregon Court of Appeals

319 Or.App. 208

510 P.3d 247

In the MATTER OF B. Y., a Youth.State of Oregon, Respondent,

v.B. Y., Appellant.

A172581

Court of Appeals of Oregon.

Argued and submitted July 7, 2021.

April 20, 2022

Christa Obold Eshleman argued the cause for appellant. Also on the brief was Youth, Rights & Justice.

Jonathan N. Schildt, Assistant Attorney General, argued the cause for respondent. Also on the brief were Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, and Benjamin Gutman, Solicitor General.

Before James, Presiding Judge, and Lagesen, Chief Judge, and Kamins, Judge.

KAMINS, J.

Youth appeals from a dispositional judgment committing him to the Oregon Youth Authority (OYA) for placement in a youth correction facility for one year, to be served consecutively to his commitment from prior cases. Youth makes two assignments of error. First, he assigns error to the trial court's order to run the commitment consecutively to his commitment from prior cases. Second, he assigns error to the trial court's imposition of a one-year commitment when the statutory maximum is 364 days. We conclude that a juvenile court does not have authority to impose consecutive commitments and that the imposition of a one-year commitment amounted to plain error. We reverse and remand for the juvenile court to reconsider its disposition and otherwise affirm.

In 2017, youth was committed to the custody of the OYA for three and a half years in a combined disposition and spent most of his time committed to a youth correction facility. At one point, youth was paroled and subsequently ran away from his placement. When police attempted to apprehend him, he refused to follow the officer's order to stop and lie on the ground and was then charged with conduct that, if committed by an adult, would constitute the offense of interfering with a peace officer, ORS 162.247, a Class A misdemeanor. Youth admitted to the charge, and in October 2019, the juvenile court ordered him to serve a one-year commitment to OYA, to be served consecutively to the 2017 commitment, which was set to end in November 2020.

Youth timely appealed, assigning error to the juvenile court's order imposing the commitment consecutively to his commitment from prior cases and to the court's imposition of a one-year commitment for a Class A misdemeanor.

By way of background, juvenile delinquency proceedings consist of two stages that are roughly comparable to conviction and sentencing in adult criminal cases. State v. Barrett , 350 Or. 390, 401, 255 P.3d 472 (2011). The first stage is the adjudication, where the juvenile court determines whether a youth has committed an act that would be a crime if committed by an adult. Id. The second is the juvenile court's determination of the consequences that should follow from the adjudication, which is called the disposition. Id. at 402, 255 P.3d 472. ORS 419C.501(1) outlines durational limits on different types of dispositions, one of which includes commitment to the OYA, which is the type of disposition youth in this case received. Under ORS 419C.501(1) and (2), a juvenile court disposition can be for an indefinite period, but, similarly to adult sentences of incarceration, the statute imposes limitations on commitments and periods of institutionalization. It is that limitation that we address in this opinion.

Youth argues that, because the juvenile code is sui generis , the court's dispositional authority must be explicit. See Kelley v. Gibson , 184 Or. App. 343, 348, 56 P.3d 925 (2002) ("Because proceedings under the juvenile code are sui generis , a juvenile court's actions must be authorized by the statutes that created it."); Webster's Third New Int'l Dictionary 2286 (unabridged ed. 2002) (defining sui generis as "of its own kind : constituting a class alone : unique, peculiar"). Specifically, youth notes that, under the current version of the statute that governs maximum dispositions, ORS 419C.501, there is no authority granting a juvenile court permission to impose consecutive commitments. Because no authority outside the juvenile code can be interpreted as authorizing consecutive commitments, youth contends that to grant that authority would be contrary to the rehabilitative purpose of the juvenile code.

The state concedes that there is no express statutory authority for consecutive commitments but argues that the legislature's silence on that issue does not mean that the legislature intended for juvenile courts to have no authority to do so. The state points out that we have already interpreted the juvenile code to authorize consecutive commitments under a prior version of ORS 419C.501, former ORS 419.511 (1971), repealed by Or. Laws 1993, ch. 33, § 373. State ex rel. Juv. Dept. v. T. , 27 Or. App. 407, 409, 556 P.2d 146 (1976). Citing legislative history that postdates that case, the state argues that there was no legislative intent to remove that authority with any of the subsequent changes made to the juvenile code. Additionally, even absent legislation permitting the imposition of consecutive commitments, the state maintains that it has long been settled law that trial courts have inherent authority to impose consecutive sentences in the adult context, and the reasoning applies with equal force to juvenile courts. See, e.g. , State v. Jones , 250 Or. 59, 61, 440 P.2d 371 (1968) ; State v. Norman , 71 Or. App. 389, 392, 692 P.2d 665 (1984), rev. den. , 299 Or. 31, 698 P.2d 964, cert. den. , 471 U.S. 1020, 105 S.Ct. 2049, 85 L.Ed.2d 311 ; 471 U.S. 1139, 105 S.Ct. 2685, 86 L.Ed.2d 702 (1985).

We review questions of statutory construction for errors of law. State v. E. C.-P. , 289 Or. App. 569, 572, 410 P.3d 1045 (2017). When we interpret a statute, "[w]e ascertain the legislature's intentions by examining the text of the statute in its context, along with relevant legislative history, and, if necessary, canons of construction." State v. Cloutier , 351 Or. 68, 75, 261 P.3d 1234 (2011) (citing State v. Gaines , 346 Or. 160, 171-73, 206 P.3d 1042 (2009) ). "In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, we assume that the legislature intended to give those words their ‘plain, natural, and ordinary meaning.’ " State v. Ziska/Garza , 355 Or. 799, 804, 334 P.3d 964 (2014) (quoting PGE v. Bureau of Labor and Industries , 317 Or. 606, 611, 859 P.2d 1143 (1993) ).

The relevant language in the current version of ORS 419C.501, the statute governing limitations on the duration of commitments, prescribes that "the period of institutionalization or commitment may not exceed" and then lists out the maximums based on the category of offense.¹ The plain text is silent on how to deal with a situation where a youth has been adjudicated for multiple offenses.

Our statutory analysis is also informed by cases previously construing the relevant statute or its predecessors. Cloutier , 351 Or. at 100, 261 P.3d 1234. A previous version of the statute implicitly authorized consecutive dispositions for separate offenses. T. , 27 Or. App. at 409, 556 P.2d 146 (citing former ORS 419.507(2) (1975), repealed by Or. Laws 1993, ch. 33, § 373, and former ORS 419.511(1) and (3) (1971) ). The statute that governed maximum dispositions in that case, former ORS 419.511 (1971), provided that the duration of disposition "shall not exceed the maximum period of institutionalization or commitment authorized if the act had been committed by an adult." At the time that T. was decided, courts handling adult criminal cases had inherent authority to impose consecutive sentences. Jones , 250 Or. at 61, 440 P.2d 371. Therefore, a youth's maximum disposition would have included consecutive dispositions, as that was the law governing adults at that time. T. , 27 Or. App. at 409, 556 P.2d 146.

Former ORS 419.511 (1971) was redesignated ORS 419C.501 in 1993, but the language stating that the period of any disposition "shall not exceed the maximum period of institutionalization or commitment authorized if the act had been committed by an adult" remained the same. Or. Laws 1993, ch. 33, § 246. ORS 419C.501 was again amended in 1995 and the language linking maximum dispositions with adult maximums was again unaltered. Or. Laws 1995, ch. 422, § 85. That language was finally removed in 1999 and replaced with the current language specifying maximum commitment periods based on the category of offense, with only minor subsequent alterations. Or. Laws 1999, ch. 964, § 1.²

The state contends that the legislative history of the 1999 amendments to ORS 419C.501 reveals that the legislature's removal of that language did not reflect an intent to strip juvenile courts of the dispositional authority that we recognized in T. We agree that the legislative history does not reveal that specific intent. Rather, the change was inspired by a pending Court of Appeals case posing the question whether "the maximum time the youth could serve [was] limited to the time an adult would actually serve if sentencing guidelines were applied." Exhibit B, House Committee on Judiciary, Subcommittee on Criminal Law, HB 3047, May 4, 1999 (testimony of Larry Oglesby, representing Oregon Juvenile Department Directors' Association). The bill's work group was concerned that "[t]hat interpretation would mean that in some cases youth would have to be released back into the community prematurely[.]" Id. According to legislative testimony, the aim of the amendment was to "restate[ ] the time limit on the period of institutionalization or commitment in terms of a specific number of years, rather than having it tied to the length of time an adult could serve for those crimes." Id. ; see also Tape Recording, House Committee on Judiciary, Subcommittee on Criminal Law, HB 3047, May 4, 1999, Tape 178, Side A (statement by Larry Oglesby, representing Oregon Juvenile Department Directors' Association) (stating that the purpose of the amendment was to "clarify that the time that a youth can be committed to a youth correction facility is a specific length of...