U.S. v. Doe, s. 79-1687

• Decision Date: 07 April 1980
• Docket Number: Nos. 79-1687,79-1688,s. 79-1687
• Citation: 631 F.2d 110
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jane DOE, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 110

631 F.2d 110

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jane DOE, Defendant-Appellant.

Nos. 79-1687, 79-1688.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

April 7, 1980.

Rehearing Denied May 30, 1980.

Certiorari Denied Oct. 6, 1980.

See 101 S.Ct. 202.

Barry D. Utsinger, San Diego, Cal., for defendant-appellant.

Roger W. Haines, Jr., Asst. U. S. Atty., argued Michael Walsh, U.S. Atty., Roger W. Haines, Jr., Sandra J. Wittman, Asst. U. S. Attys., San Diego, Cal., on the brief for plaintiff-appellee.

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

Before SNEED and PREGERSON, Circuit Judges, and TEMPLAR, ^* District Judge.

SNEED, Circuit Judge:

Appellant was charged in No. 79-1687 with importation of marijuana and in No. 79-1689 with jumping bail and was adjudged to be a juvenile delinquent on both charges. She was sentenced to consecutive two-year terms of probation. Appellant maintains that the district court lacked jurisdiction to proceed against her as a juvenile because she was over twenty-one years of age at the time of trial in the bail jump case and at the time of the imposition of the sentences in both cases. She also contends that the imposition of consecutive terms of probation amounting to a total of four years violated the two-year maximum term established in 18 U.S.C. § 5037(b) (1976). We reject the appellant's jurisdictional argument and affirm the judgments. However, we find merit in appellant's objection to a four-year probation term and reverse and remand for correction of the sentences.

I. FACTS

In 1976, appellant, then seventeen years old, was arrested for attempting to enter the United States while carrying marijuana and heroin in her vehicle. A four-count information was filed against her, and on March 23, 1976, appellant admitted the allegations of the count charging her with importation of marijuana. The court orally found appellant to be a juvenile delinquent and continued the case for sentencing until June 21.

Appellant did not appear for sentencing but instead went to Mexico, where she remained for almost three years. On June 7, 1979, appellant surrendered before Judge Edward J. Schwartz. On August 14, 1979, an information was filed charging appellant with juvenile delinquency on the basis of her failure to appear for sentencing on the marijuana charge. Appellant denied the charge and requested a trial, which was scheduled for September 18, 1979. Disposition of the marijuana charge was also postponed, with appellant's consent, until September 18.

Then occurred the event that creates the issues of this case. On September 2, appellant became twenty-one years old. Thereafter, on September 10, she moved to dismiss both cases for lack of jurisdiction. The motion was denied. At trial, appellant was adjudged to be a juvenile delinquent on the bail jump charge and was sentenced to consecutive two-year terms of probation on the marijuana and bail jump charges. She appeals.

II. JURISDICTION

Before 1974, juvenile status was defined in the Federal Juvenile Delinquency Act, Pub.L. No. 772, § 5031, 62 Stat. 857 (1948) (codified in 18 U.S.C. § 5031 (1970)) as follows:

For the purposes of this chapter a "juvenile" is a person who has not attained his eighteenth birthday, and "juvenile delinquency" is the violation of a law of the United States committed by a juvenile and not punishable by death or life imprisonment.

In applying this definition, some federal courts held that an alleged offender, though over eighteen, was nonetheless subject to juvenile treatment if he had been under eighteen at the time the offense was committed. United States v. Williams, 459 F.2d 903, 905 (2d Cir. 1972); United States v. Fotto, 103 F.Supp. 430 (S.D.N.Y.1952). However, it also was held that jurisdiction terminated at age twenty-one. Cases so holding were based not on section 5031, which defined juvenile status, but rather on section 5034 (codified as 18 U.S.C. § 5034 (1970)), which permitted a court to impose sentence on a juvenile only for the period of his minority. See, e. g., United States v. Hall, 306 F.Supp. 735 (E.D.Tenn.1969).

In 1974, Congress enacted amendments to the Juvenile Delinquency Act. Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, Pub.L. No. 93-415, Title V, Part A, 88 Stat. 1109, 1133. Under the amended act, if a juvenile delinquent is over nineteen at the time of disposition, the court may impose a sentence which runs beyond the juvenile's twenty-first birthday. 18 U.S.C. § 3057(b) (1976). Thus, the amendment renders earlier decisions holding that juvenile jurisdiction ended when an individual turned twenty-one inapplicable in this case. However, section 5031 was also amended in 1974, and now reads:

For the purposes of this chapter, a "juvenile" is a person who has not attained his eighteenth birthday, or for the purpose of proceedings and disposition under this chapter for an alleged act of juvenile delinquency, a person who has not attained his twenty-first birthday, and "juvenile delinquency" is the violation of a law of the United States committed by a person prior to his eighteenth birthday which would have been a crime if committed by an adult.

18 U.S.C. § 5031 (1976) (emphasis added).

Borrowing from the pre-1974 interpretation of section 5034, appellant interprets section 5031 as amended to mean that juvenile jurisdiction ends when an accused attains the age twenty-one, without regard to the stage to which juvenile proceedings then may have advanced. The government, on the other hand, argues that the filing of an information against an accused commences the process of "proceedings and disposition," for the purposes of section 5031, and that juvenile jurisdiction should thus be determined by the accused's age at the time the information is filed.

The language of section 5031 compels acceptance of neither interpretation.

Both are plausible. Nor are we aware of other cases that have discussed the issue. Because it is important that jurisdiction be established at the beginning of a proceeding and that once fixed it endure throughout, we hold that the government's interpretation of section 5031 is preferable. Under the appellant's reading, a court would not know whether its jurisdiction in a juvenile case was dependable until after final disposition. The result would be a waste of judicial resources. Cases frequently would abort after court and counsel had already expended considerable time and effort in preparation and trial.

More serious would be the effects of appellant's view on the conduct of proceedings. In cases in which an alleged offender was nearing twenty-one, the government would be forced either to postpone the initiation of a proceeding so that the accused could be treated as an adult, or to rush the proceeding to its conclusion so that the case would reach disposition before the accused's twenty-first birthday. Neither course is desirable. The former would entail undesirable, and perhaps unconstitutional, delay; the latter would cause cases to be tried and disposed of without adequate time for preparation or deliberation. Courts and juveniles also would be affected. A court, for example, would be disinclined to grant legitimate requests for continuances in order to avoid losing jurisdiction. Juveniles would have a strong incentive to create delays or even, as in this case, to flee before the case could be finished. On the other hand, if retrial as an adult were permitted, the juvenile would be under pressure to admit guilt or to seek hasty disposition of his case in order to receive the more lenient treatment accorded juveniles.

None of these consequences is consistent with the purposes of the Juvenile Delinquency Act or with the ideal of due process of law. We, therefore, reject the appellant's interpretation of section 5031. We take modest comfort in the fact that appellant's contention is belied by section 5037(b) which permits juveniles to be placed in commitment or on probation, and thus kept within juvenile jurisdiction, for periods extending beyond their twenty-first birthday.

Consistent with our interpretation of section 5031, we hold that inasmuch as the offenses with which appellant was charged occurred while she was under the age of eighteen and both informations against appellant were filed before her twenty-first birthday, the district court was correct in treating...