D.C. v. State

When he was fourteen years old, D.C. and three other boys broke into the home of an elderly woman, ransacked the home, and injured the homeowner. At a dispositional hearing, the juvenile court imposed on D.C. a determinate commitment of two years at the Department of Correction to be followed by an indeterminate commitment. D.C. appealed the dispositional order, arguing that the juvenile court incorrectly ordered both a determinate commitment and indeterminate commitment. The court of appeals agreed and reversed in part and remanded with instructions that the juvenile court impose a determinate commitment only. The Supreme Court granted transfer and reversed the trial court's dispositional order, holding that the determinate and indeterminate commitment statutes in question were unambiguously mutually exclusive, and thus the trial court could impose only one of the commitments on D.C. Remanded to the trial court to decide, in its discretion, which type of commitment was appropriate. View "D.C. v. State" on Justia Law