Wiggins v. State

• Decision Date: 05 September 1975
• Docket Number: No. 185,185
• Parties: Alphonso C. WIGGINS v. STATE of Maryland.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 689

275 Md. 689

344 A.2d 80

Alphonso C. WIGGINS v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 185.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

Sept. 5, 1975.

Peter S. Smith, Baltimore (Michael S. Elder, Baltimore, on the brief), for appellant.

James I. Keane, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Francis B. Burch, Atty. Gen. and Clarence W. Sharp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Baltimore, on the brief), for appellee.

Argued before SINGLEY, SMITH, DIGGES, LEVINE, ELDRIDGE and O'DONNELL, JJ.

SMITH, Judge.

In this case appellant, Alphonso C. Wiggins (Wiggins), asks us to overrule our approval in Franklin v. State, 264 Md. 62, 68, 285 A.2d 616, 619 (1972), of 'May 15, 1969, the date of finality set out in . . . Long (v. Robinson, 316 F.Supp. 22 (D.Md.1970), aff'd, 436 F.2d 1116 (4th Cir. 1971),) and adopted by Greene (v. State, 11 Md.App. 106, 273 A.2d 830 (1971))' as 'an appropriate, proper and valid selection' of an effective date for the applicability of that holding. It is pointed out in this regard that Woodall v. Pettibone, 465 F.2d 49 (4th Cir. 1972), cert. denied, 413 U.S. 922, 93 S.Ct. 3054, 37 L.Ed.2d 1044 (1973), held that Long should be retroactively applied. However, the holding of that court in this matter is not binding upon us. We shall decline most respectfully to accede to the point of view there expressed since we believe it to be in error.

In Long the court held '(t)he Maryland Juvenile Causes Act, Md.Ann.Code ((1957, 1966 Repl.Vol.)), Art. 26, Secs. 51 et seq., . . . unconstitutional insofar as it exempts Baltimore City from the uniform juvenile age requirement of eighteen (18) years,' as well as '(t)he provisions of Art. 4, S240 of the Public Local Laws of Baltimore City, as applied since 1945, . . . insofar as they define a child as a 'person under the age of sixteen years' thereby excluding sixteen and seventeen year olds in Baltimore City from the scope of the Juvenile Causes Act.'

It is stipulated: Wiggins was born on June 23, 1944. He was indicted in 1960 on a charge of burglary allegedly committed on August 2, 1960. He was convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not more than one year to run from August 15, 1960. In 1961 he was indicted on five counts of burglary allegedly committed on May 29, June 2, July 3, July 9, and July 26, 1960. He was convicted and sentenced on each count to one year imprisonment, some of which sentences were to be consecutive and some concurrent. He was imprisoned at the Maryland Correctional Institution at Hagerstown, Maryland, from September 28, 1960, until February 4, 1963. Since he had not attained 16 years of age at the time of the incidents on May 29, 1960, and June 2, 1960, '(h)e was waived to the jurisdiction of the criminal Court of Baltimore to be tried as an adult offender on th(o)se indictments pursuant to a waiver order signed by the Honorable Charles E. Moylan (of the Division for Juvenile Causes of the Circuit Court of Baltimore City on) February 23, 1961. No hearing was held prior to the signing of the waiver order,' nor was Wiggins physically present in the Circuit Court of Baltimore City 'either immediately preceding or at the time the above mentioned waiver order was signed and (he) was at no time brought before that court in connection with the offenses for which he was waived.' He was then incarcerated as a convicted adult felon.

Wiggins filed a bill of complaint in the Circuit Court of Baltimore City against the State of Maryland and the Clerk of the Criminal Court of Baltimore in which he requested the court 'to declare that the aforementioned convictions of (him) are a nullity and that (he) may suffer no legal disabilities as a result of such convictions.' He also asked the court 'to permanently enjoin defendants from keeping or maintaining any record whatsoever stating or in any way indicating that (wiggins) was convicted of the burglary offenses' previously mentioned. That court ruled against Wiggins. He appealed. The Court of Special Appeals in Wiggins v. State, 22 Md.App. 291, 324 A.2d 172 (1974), considered and rejected the points here raised. We granted certiorari in order that we might consider the important constitutional question here involved.

Although we set forth much of the background of the Maryland statutes relative to juveniles in Matter of Anderson, 272 Md. 85, 94-95, 321 A.2d 516 (1974), we shall again refer to that background for a better understanding of this controversy. Originally, juvenile matters in Maryland were handled by specially designated justices of the peace rather than by judges of courts of general trial jurisdiction. The Maryland Constitution never required justices of the peace to be lawyers and most of them were not lawyers. Provision for a special judicial officer to handle juvenile matters came into Maryland law with passage of Chapter 611 of the Acts of 1902 authorizing the appointment in Baltimore City of a 'Magistrate for Juvenile Causes' to 'have exclusive jurisdiction of all cases of trial, or commitment for trial, or of commitment to any reformatory or other institution, of all minors under sixteen years of age . . ..'

In 1940 Governor Herbert R. O'Conor appointed a Juvenile Delinquency Commission 'to consider the whole field of the treatment of juvenile delinquency in Maryland, and to report its findings to the Governor and to the General Assembly at its session of 1941.' It pointed ut that 'Baltimore (was) the only large city in the United States whose Juvenile Court judges (were) Justices of the Peace.' It recommended 'an enabling amendment to empower the Legislature to establish a Juvenile Court in Baltimore City.' Chapter 824 of the Acts of 1941 proposed to the people of Maryland a constitutional amendment creating '(a) Juvenile Court . . . for Baltimore City.' The amendment also would have authorized the General Assembly to 'establish a Juvenile Court for any other incorporated city or town or any county of the State.' This proposed amendment was rejected by the electorate.

The Governor was authorized by Chapter 323 of the Acts of 1931, which became Code (1939) Art. 52, §§ 83-91, inclusive, to appoint 'an additional justice of the peace for each county to be known as the magistrate for juvenile causes for the particular county.' This provision did not apply to Baltimore City nor to Allegany, Washington, and Baltimore Counties. The person so appointed was to be 'at least twenty-five years of age (and) a member of the bar of the Court of Appeals of Maryland.' There was the further proviso that 'no such appointment sh(ould) be made in any county until the County Commissioners sh(ould) have provided a salary for such Justice, and sh(ould) have notified the Governor that such provision ha(d) been made.' ¹ Such justices of the peace were to 'have exclusive jurisdiction where jurisdiction (was) given by law to any justice of the peace or magistrate for criminal causes in all cases of trial, or commitment for trial, or commitment to any juvenile institution of any minor under the age of sixteen (16) years.' By Code (1924) Art. 52, § 12 justices of the peace of the State except in Baltimore City, Talbot, Harford, Montgomery, and Frederick Counties, were granted 'jurisdiction to hear, try and determine all cases involving the charge of any offense, crime or misdemeanor, not punishable by confinement in the Penitentiary or involving a felonious intent, which m(ight) be committed within their respective Counties' as well as 'all prosecutions or proceedings for the recovery of any penalty for doing or omitting to do any act within their respective Counties, the doing of which or the omission to do which, (was) made punishable under the laws of this State by any pecuniary fine or penalty, or by imprisonment in jail or in the Maryland House of Correction, all of which acts or omissions (were) (t)hereby declared to be criminal offenses . . ..' From this it will be seen that from 1931 in most, but not all, of the State, if a county in its wisdom elected to fund the office of magistrate for juvenile causes then there was to be such a magistrate who then would have exclusive jurisdiction of those prosecutions of persons under 16 which involved misdemeanors, but not felonies. By Chapter 807 of the Acts of 1941 this 16 year provision was raised to 18 years with the further provision that the magistrate should 'have concurrent jurisdiction in such cases with the Circuit Courts for the several counties where the minor (was) eighteen (18) years of age but under the age of twenty-one (21).'

The appointment by Governor O'Conor of the Juvenile Delinquency Commission in 1940 had been followed by his appointment on November 1, 1941, of a Commission on the Judiciary Article of the Constitution of Maryland, commonly known as the 'Bond Commission' for its chairman, Chief Judge Carroll T. Bond of this Court. The Bond Commission was of the opinion that in order to avoid the multiplication of courts a juvenile court in Baltimore City should be a branch of the Supreme Bench and that a judge of that bench qualified for such work should continue to serve in juvenile matters without rotation in order to promote the most effective administration. ² The Report of the Maryland Commission on Juvenile Delinquency 73 (1943) stated that it 'accept(ed) the view that our present courts, that is the Supreme Bench in Baltimore City and the Circuit Courts in the several counties, have inherent jurisdiction to secure to every child in the State proper care and guidance if he or she is lacking in same, whether due to neglect, dependency, delinquency, feeble-mindedness or to a combination of two or more of these causes.' It then went on to recommend:

'Creation of a juvenile court in Baltimore city and in each county or at least in each Judicial Circuit, that shall have (1) original, exclusive jurisdiction, unless expressly waived by such courts in favor of the criminal courts, over children up to 16 years of age in all cases of delinquency, dependency, neglect,...