JUVENILE LAW
SUMMER 2009
(A) Reform Movement in Juvenile Law
o Children and adults should not be treated the same
o Delinquents sent to reform schools
§ Goals:
· Redirect bad behavior
· Replace parent’s duty to educate and discipline
· Parent right to custody is natural right but not inalienable right.
(B) White House conference on Children in 1909
o Service and economic programs need to be designed to protect home vs removed from home
o Social Work Model:
§ Individualized treatment
§ Protect the home and strengthen the family vs. prosecute the parents.
(C) Philosophy of Parens Patriae
o State act as parent
o Parents have duty to be the guardian of the child: natural right o custody of child
o Subject to legislative power
o Child ns not criminal, rather in need of care.
§ Treated same as neglected and abused children
o New Concept of supervision/probation vs removal
§ Still had reform schools and detention.
o New Language
§ Kids are not criminals, they’re delinquents
§ Movement seen as sentimental and humanitarian approach
(D) 1st Juvenile Court to Deal with Delinquency was in Illinois
o 5 Goals
§ Individualized reformation of offender
§ Indeterminate sentences
§ No due process b/c they were not criminals.
§ Broad discretion form ore innovative rehabilitation programs
§ Liberal evidence rules to create individual treatment plan.
· This sprang entire way we treat kids today.
Criminal vs. Juvenile Adults
(A) Adult court 17 or older.
1. Exception if you’re under juvenile court jx, like if you’re 16 and you turn 17 the next day—what can happen is the juvenile court can terminate your jx and send you to adult court or they can keep you in juvenile court.
2. If you steal something—you get arrested—they can hold you for 24 hours w/o charging you with anything, this allows police to make a case and determine whether to file charges. (Prosecutor makes determination of whether to file charges.) You call lawyer, police interrogate you, etc.
3. Remedy if they hold you for longer than 24 hours, you will try to exclude anything that happens beyond the 24 hours.
4. Charges are filed and this is called a “Complaint”
5. Attached to complaint is an affidavit, swearing that info in complaint is true and accurate to the best of their knowledge.
6. Process after this
§ Initial Appearance (get notice)
§ Preliminary Hearing or
· Determine if there is probable cause (preliminary hearing)
· After this, they file a Information
· Circuit Court Arraignment
· Plead not guilty
· Trial
§ Grand Jury
· Grand Jury—D does not get to go. Secret process where prosecutor goes, there is a jury and they make a determination if there is probable cause to go forward.
· Indictment
· Circuit Court Arraignment
· Plead Not guilty
· Trial
(B) Juvenile Court Process
1. Juvenile gets detained
§ Taken to Detention Center
§ Must notify parents
§ Have 24 hours for Judge to continue to detain to determine probable cause. (judge must respond in 24 hours)
2. Detention Hearing (in 3 days)
§ Only thing that happens at detention hearing is if he remains detained or go home.
3. Charged by Petition (petition is what’s filed in a civil matter)
§ Must give sufficient notice of what you’re being charged with.
4. Initial Hearing
§ Child ask to admit or deny charges.
§ If child admits, he goes straight to disposition.
§ If child does not admit, then you have the adjudication hearing.
5. Adjudication Hearing is what the trial is called.
§ If you admit to the offense or have been found to committed the act, you have a Disposition Hearing.
6. Disposition Hearing (determines what will happen to you)
§ Not sentenced, you’re committed to a particular thing.
(C) 2 Ways a child can be subject to Jx of Juvenile Court (Marcum v. Ferrell)
1. By “Petition” praying that the child be adjudged “neglected or delinquent”
2. Certification from any other court before which such person is brought, charged with the commission of a crime.
§ Juvenile courts shall have the “exclusive jx” to hear and determine criminal charges against juveniles, except charges of capital offenses.
(D) Why Juvenile Courts were created?
1. To shield children from criminal court surroundings; to bring them into new tribunals where they might be considered not as criminals, but as children in need of aid, protection, and guidance.
(E) Mack article (page 63)
1. Said focus should be on the best way to help a child. (Child’s best interest)
2. Criminal evidence—ordinary legal evidence is not what should be heard in the proceeding. NO legal evidence.
3. Environment child should be exposed to—seated at a table together like a family.
4. Counselor vs. Decision maker.
(F) Beckham Article (page 64)
1. Focus should be on reform vs. punishment.
2. Punishment is more like retribution whereas reform takes on a different form, its like a motive.
3. Reform not only helps the kid, but helps society in the long run. (can make a change)
4. Adult court and Juvenile court should be different
§ Juvenile
§ Not using criminal terms
§ No profanity
§ No lewd comments
5. Adult
(G) Goals of How Juvenile Court Should Run
1. Cooperation
2. Earning Trust (everyone)
3. Appreciation
§ this will lead to appreciation of how things turn out.
4. This Teaches child how to behave
5. Role of lawyer was to be cooperative (to say and do the least as possible)
(H) In Re Holmes
1. Holds that juvenile courts are criminal courts are different.
I. CONSTITUTIONAL RESTRAINTS
1. IN RE GAULT—Constitutional Rights (most important case in Juvenile Law)—(Pg 83)
(a) Gault was already on probation for being in the company of a young boy who had stolen a wallet. He was picked up again when a woman called the police and told them that the boys had called her and made lewd remarks. No notice was given to the parents that their son had been picked up. A Petition was filed, but it was not served on the Gaults. The complaining witness did not show up for court, no one was sworn in at the hearing, the petition made no factual basis for the judicial action which was initiated, the petition only stated that the juvenile was in need of the protection of the court.
(b) Child filed a habeas motion for being unlawfully detained.
(c) The judge held the child delinquent based on a charge he was not found guilty of.
(d) Gault argued that several of his Due Process rights under the 14th Amend had been violated. Court held that Juveniles have 5 Constitutional Rights under Due Process.
(e) 5 Due Process Rights (guaranteed by Gault): All of these are triggered by deprivation of your liberty. Only has to be a threat of your liberty being deprived.
a. Right to Notice
a. Notice to comply with due process requirements, must be given
sufficiently in advance of scheduled court proceedings so that reasonable
opportunity to prepare will be afforded.
b. Notice must also set forth the alleged misconduct with particularity in writing.
c. specific facts w/in a reasonable time to be prepared.
d. Something setting out the majority of the facts of the case.
b. Right to Counsel
a. Probation Officer cannot act as Counsel for a child. His role is in the
adjudicatory hearing is as arresting officer and witness against the child.
b. Where a child may be found delinquent and subject to loss of his liberty for years is comparable in seriousness to a felony prosecution.
c. Therefore, the juvenile need assistance of counsel to cope with problems of law, to make skilled inquiry into the facts, to insist upon regularity of the proceedings, and to ascertain whether he has defense and to prepare and submit it.
d. The child and his parents must be notified of the child’s rights to be represented by counsel or if they are unable to afford counsel, that counsel will be appointed.
i. Child’s right to counsel, not counsel.
ii. Right is for the child, unless you are the guardian ad li
g affected)
a. Childs interest in not being committed
b. Parent’s interest in the child’s health.
(2) Risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through the procedures used
a. What is the procedure that the state has set up and will this procedure have a risk of erroneously depriving the child.
(3) Government or State’s interest
a. State’s interest in the procedures it has adopted for commitment and treatment of children.
b. Does the State’s procedures protect against arbitrariness in the decision to commit a child to a state mental hospital.
c. Welfare of the child.
d. Holdings of the Court.
(1) Liberty Interest of Child. (14th Amendment Implicated)
(1) A child has a protectible interest, not only in being free from unnecessary bodily restraints, but in not being labeled erroneously by some b/c of an improper decision by the State Hospital superintendent.
(2) Interest of Parent to have child committed.
(1) Parents retain a substantial, if not the dominant, role in the decision to admit a child to a mental institution, absent abuse or neglect, and that the traditional presumption is that the parents act in the best interests of their child should apply.
(2) No adversarial hearing is needed before the court to make this determination for the parent.
(3) State interest in having the child committed.
(1) State has an interest in confining the use of its mental facilities to cases of genuine need.
(2) State has an interest in not imposing unnecessary procedural obstacles that may discourage the mentally ill or their families form seeking needed psychiatric assistance.
(3) State has an interest in allocating priority diagnosis and treatment of patients as soon as they are admitted to a hospital rather than to time-consuming procedural minuets before the admission.
(4) Process that protects the child Constitutional Rights by reducing risks of error w/o infringing upon parental authority and w/o undercutting the legitimate interests of both the state and the patient that are best served by “voluntary commitments.”
(1) Court held that the risk of error is sufficiently great that “an inquiry should be made by a ‘neutral factfinder’ to determine if the child needs to be institutionalized or meets the statutory requirements for admission.
a. This person does not have to be a lawyer or a judge.
b. This person has to be psychiatrist or nurse practitioner or any specialist in the medical field.
o Their factfinding does not have to be a formal hearing.
c. Neutral person cannot have a vested interest in the child’s health.
d. Factors: Fact finder must review certain medical documents.
o Child’s background
o Interview
o Periodic review to make sure the child still needs treatment.
o Parents, schools, teachers, social workers, anyone involved with the child.
(2) Another reason for Neutral Fact finder
a. Treatment quicker
b. May be harmful to a child.
c. Not good for the child about what they’re doing.
d. May create a problem for child and parent w/parent disclosing what the child does.
(3) Medical specialist in best position to make this determination.
(4) Hospital has a right to refuse to admit based on the child’s interest.
