Justia Juvenile Law Opinion Summaries

Michael and April are the biological parents of Avalyn, born out of wedlock in 2002. A court ordered Michael to pay child support but did not order visitation. In 2005, the state took temporary emergency custody of Avalyn after April attempted suicide. The county sought an adjudication under Neb. Rev. Stat. 43-247(3)(a), but did not give Michael notice. Avalyn was placed in foster care with her maternal grandmother in April’s home. Michael claims that because he was paying support through the state, caseworkers knew or should have known how to contact him. About six months after the disposition he received notice and intervened. The court placed Avalyn with Michael until November 2007, when the parties stipulated that Avalyn should be placed with April but divide her time between her parents. In a suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, Michael alleged that in failing to notify him of the juvenile proceedings, the defendants interfered with constitutional rights to familial integrity, substantive due process, and equal protection and that the Nebraska statutes were unconstitutional. The Nebraska Supreme Court held that claims against state defendants for monetary damages were barred by sovereign immunity; qualified immunity shielded employees from liability in their individual capacities because they did not violate a clearly established right. Claims for declaratory and injunctive relief were not barred. In a juvenile proceeding alleging abuse, neglect, or dependency, due process requires notice and an opportunity to be heard for a child’s known adjudicated or biological father who is providing substantial and regular financial support; the statutes at issue are not facially unconstitutional, but cannot be constitutionally applied to avoid notification. View "Michael E. v. State" on Justia Law

Robert Lee Colton Dietsch appealed his conviction for sexual assault of a twelve-year-old girl. Dietsch was seventeen at the time of the alleged assault. The State charged Dietsch as an adult. Dietsch moved to transfer prosecution from the district court to the youth court. The district court denied the motion. Dietsch later entered into a plea agreement whereby he agreed to plead guilt to one count of sexual assault in exchange for the State's agreement to drop a sexual consent without consent charge. Ultimately Dietsch received a deferred sentence of six years and sixty days. On appeal to the Supreme Court, Dietsch argued the district court abused its discretion in refusing to transfer his case to the youth court. The Supreme Court concluded sufficient evidence supported the district court's decision. However, the Court concluded the district court erred in its imposition of certain conditions on Dietsch, including setting an indeterminate amount for restitution, and failing to retain jurisdiction over the case until Dietsch reached age 21. Accordingly, the Court remanded the case for further proceedings.View "Montana v. Dietsch" on Justia Law

In 1990, defendant, then 14 years old, was arrested for two fatal shootings. Following a discretionary hearing under the Juvenile Court Act, the court allowed defendant to be prosecuted under the criminal laws. He was convicted of two first degree murders, attempted first degree murders of two others, and home invasion. Because defendant was convicted of murdering more than one victim, the Unified Code of Corrections, 730 ILCS 5/5-8-1(a)(1)(c), required a term of natural life imprisonment, with parole not available. He was also sentenced to 30 years for each attempted murder and home invasion, all to run concurrently. The appellate court affirmed. In 1996-1998 defendant filed three post-conviction petitions. All were dismissed; the appellate court affirmed the dismissals. In 2002, defendant filed another petition, arguing that the natural life sentence was unconstitutional because defendant did not actually participate in the act of killing; that the sentence violated the Eighth Amendment; and that the statute requiring a mandatory life sentence violated the Illinois Constitution as applied to a 14-year-old. The circuit court dismissed, noting that defendant carried a weapon and actually entered the abode where the murders occurred. The appellate court affirmed. Defendant another petition in 2011, arguing violation of the Eighth Amendment in light of the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision, Graham v. Florida, and ineffective assistance because counsel failed to interview an eyewitness before the juvenile hearing. The court denied the petition. While appeal was pending, the Supreme Court decided in Miller v. Alabama (2012), that “mandatory life without parole for those under the age of 18 at the time of their crimes violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on ‘cruel and unusual punishments.’ ” The appellate court concluded that Miller applies retroactively on post-conviction review and remanded for a new sentencing hearing, but upheld denial of the ineffective assistance claim. The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed. View "People v. Davis" on Justia Law

In each of two underlying cases, a 14-year-old was convicted of murder and sentenced to a mandatory term of life imprisonment without possibility of parole. The highest courts of Alabama and Arkansas upheld the sentences. The Supreme Court reversed. The Eighth Amendment forbids a sentencing scheme that mandates life in prison without possibility of parole for juvenile homicide offenders. Children are constitutionally different from adults for sentencing purposes. Their lack of maturity and underdeveloped sense of responsibility lead to recklessness, impulsiveness, and heedless risk-taking. They are more vulnerable to negative influences and lack ability to extricate themselves from horrific, crime-producing settings. A child’s actions are less likely to be evidence of irretrievable depravity. The mandatory penalty schemes at issue prevent the sentencing court from considering youth and from assessing whether the harshest term of imprisonment proportionately punishes a juvenile offender. Life-without-parole sentences share characteristics with death sentences, demanding individualized sentencing. The Court rejected the states’ argument that courts and prosecutors sufficiently consider a juvenile defendant’s age, background and the circumstances of his crime, when deciding whether to try him as an adult. The argument ignores that many states use mandatory transfer systems or lodge the decision in the hands of the prosecutors, rather than courts. View "Miller v. Alabama" on Justia Law

In 2005, respondent was charged with delinquency under the Federal Juvenile Delinquency Act, 18 U.S.C. 5031 et seq., for sexually abusing a boy for approximately two years until respondent was 15 years old and his victim was 12 years old. Respondent was sentenced to two years of juvenile detention followed by juvenile supervision until his 21st birthday. In 2006, while respondent remained in juvenile detention, Congress enacted the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA), 42 U.S.C. 16902 et seq. In July 2007, the District Court determined that respondent had failed to comply with the requirements of his prerelease program. On appeal, respondent challenged his "special conditio[n]" of supervision and requested that the Court of Appeals "reverse th[e] portion of his sentence requiring Sex Offender Registration and remand with instructions that the district court ... strik[e] Sex Offender Registration as a condition of juvenile supervision." Over a year after respondent's 21st birthday, the Court of Appeals handed down its decision and held that the SORNA requirements violated the Ex Post Facto Clause of the Constitution, Art. I, section 9, cl. 3, when applied to juveniles adjudicated as delinquent before SORNA's enactment. The Court held that the Court of Appeals had no authority to enter that judgment because it had no live controversy before it where respondent had turned 21 and where the capable-of-repetition exception to mootness did not apply in this case. Accordingly, the judgment of the Ninth Circuit was vacated and the case remanded with instructions to dismiss the appeal. View "United States v. Juvenile Male" on Justia Law

Respondents, representing the video game and software industries, filed a preenforcement challenge to California Assembly Bill 1179 (Act), Cal. Civ. Code Ann. 1746-1746.5, which restricted the sale or rental of violent video games to minors. At issue was whether the Act comported with the First Amendment. The Court held that, because the Act imposed a restriction on the content of protected speech, it was invalid unless California could demonstrate that it passed strict scrutiny. The Court held that California had a legitimate interest in addressing a serious social problem and helping concerned parents control their children. The Court held, however, that as a means of protecting children from portrayals of violence, the legislation was seriously underinclusive, not only because it excluded portrayals other than video games, but also because it permitted a parental or avuncular veto. The Court also held that, as a means of assisting concerned parents, it was seriously overinclusive because it abridged the First Amendment rights of young people whose parents think violent video games were a harmless pastime. The Court further held that the overbreadth in achieving one goal was not cured by the overbreadth in achieving the other and therefore, the legislation could not survive strict scrutiny. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the Ninth Circuit enjoining the Act's enforcement. View "Brown, et al. v. Entertainment Merchants Assn. et al." on Justia Law

J.D.B., a thirteen-year-old seventh-grade student, was taken from his classroom to a closed-door conference room where uniformed police and school administrators questioned him for at least 30 minutes regarding two home break-ins nearby. Before beginning, they did not give J.D.B. Miranda warnings, the opportunity to call his legal guardian, or tell him he was free to leave the room. After J.D.B. subsequently confessed to the break-ins and wrote a statement at the request of police, two juvenile petitions were filed against him. J.D.B.'s public defender moved to suppress his statements and the evidence derived therefrom, arguing that he had been interrogated in a custodial setting without being afforded Miranda warnings and that his statements were involuntary. At issue was whether the age of a child subjected to police questioning was relevant to the custody analysis of Miranda v. Arizona. The Court held that it was beyond dispute that children would often feel bound to submit to police questioning when an adult in the same circumstances would feel free to leave. Seeing no reason for police officers or courts to blind themselves to that commonsense reality, the Court held that a child's age group properly informed the Miranda custody analysis. Accordingly, the Court reversed and remanded to the state courts to address whether J.D.B. was in custody when he was interrogated, taking account of all of the relevant circumstances of the interrogation, including his age at the time. View "J. D. B. v. North Carolina" on Justia Law

Nearly a decade ago, petitioners, a state child protective services worker and a county deputy sheriff, interviewed then 9-year-old S.G. at her Oregon elementary school about allegations that her father had sexually abused her. Her father stood trial for that abuse but the jury failed to reach a verdict and the charges were later dismissed. S.G.'s mother subsequently sued petitioners on S.G.'s behalf for damages under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that the in-school interview breached the Fourth Amendment's proscription on unreasonable seizures. The Ninth Circuit held that petitioners' conduct violated the Fourth Amendment but that they were entitled to qualified immunity from damages liability because no clearly established law had warned them of the illegality of the conduct. Although judgment was entered in petitioners' favor, they petitioned the Court to review the Ninth Circuit's ruling that their conduct violated the Fourth Amendment. At issue was whether government officials who prevailed on grounds of qualified immunity could obtain the Court's review of a court of appeals' decision that their conduct violated the Constitution. Also at issue was, if the Court could consider cases in this procedural posture, did the Ninth Circuit correctly determine that this interview breached the Fourth Amendment. The Court held that it could generally review a lower court's constitutional ruling at the behest of a government official granted immunity but could not do so in this case for reasons peculiar to it. The case had become moot because the child had grown up and moved across the country and so would never again be subject to the Oregon in-school interviewing practices whose constitutionality was at issue. Therefore, the Court did not reach the Fourth Amendment question in this case and vacated the part of the Ninth Circuit's opinion that decided the Fourth Amendment issue. View "Camreta v. Greene, et al.; Alford v. Greene, et al." on Justia Law

In 2010 the Supreme Court held, in Miller v. Alabama, that mandatory life without parole for those under the age of 18 at the time of their crimes violates the Eighth Amendment prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments. Three individuals, each serving a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of parole for offenses committed as juveniles, sought authorization to file successive habeas corpus petitions under 28 U.S.C. 2254 and 2255 to raise Miller claims. The parties agreed that Miller states a new rule of constitutional law, but Pennsylvania (the state in which two petitioners were convicted) argued that Miller was not retroactive; the federal prosecutor claimed that Miller was retroactive but that the other petitioner’s sentence satisfied the new Miller rule. The Third Circuit found that the petitioners had made a prima facie showing that Miller is retroactive and authorized successive habeas petitions. View "In re: Grant" on Justia Law

After her child was murdered by his father, the mother sued employees of county and state Child Protective Services (CPS) and others,, alleging negligence; violations of constitutional rights (42 U.S.C. 1983); and violation of the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act--Adoption and Safe Families Act, 42 U.S.C. 670, and of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act, 42 U.S.C. 5106. The complaint alleged that from 1998-2007, CPS received numerous complaints about the father’s abuse and neglect of the child and his siblings. The district court rejected a defense of qualified immunity. The Sixth Circuit reversed. The contours of the substantive due process right to be free from government action increasing the risk of harm was not sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would understand that pursuing the father for use of a cattle prod, while failing to immediately remove the child, would violate the child’s substantive due process rights. Given previous cases, it is not clear that a reasonable CPS official would understand that failure to seek termination of parental rights would constitute denial of procedural due process. Without ignoring the father’s role in causing the child’s death, CPS employees’ conduct cannot be said to be the “most immediate, efficient, and direct cause” of the injury. View "Jasinski v. Tyler" on Justia Law