Justia Juvenile Law Opinion Summaries

The Supreme Court granted allocatur in this case to decide “whether and when a reviewing court considering a challenge to a pretrial ruling, whether in a post-verdict or appellate context, may look beyond the record of evidence presented at the suppression hearing.” The Superior Court relied on a footnote from the Court's decision in "Commonwealth v. Chacko," (459 A.2d 311 (Pa. 1983)), for the proposition that “it [was] appropriate to consider all of the testimony, not just the testimony presented at the suppression hearing, in determining whether evidence was properly admitted.” The Superior Court, (pursuant to "Chacko") considered evidence adduced for the first time at trial when deciding whether the police properly seized contraband from Appellant, L.J. Specifically, the court affirmed the trial court’s denial of suppression because trial testimony established that L.J. voluntarily consented to the search at issue. Upon review of the record, the Supreme Court found that the Superior Court’s reliance on Chacko was understandable but ultimately misplaced. Accordingly, the Court vacated the disposition order, and remanded this case to the juvenile court for a new suppression hearing. View "In the Interest of: L.J." on Justia Law

Brandon, then 14 years old, was charged by petition for adjudication of wardship with aggravated criminal sexual abuse of his cousin M.J., then three years old, 720 ILCS 5/12-16(c)(2)(i).” M.J. was unable to testify. The state gave notice and offered statements that M.J. made to her mother and to Detective Hogren, of the Danville police department that “Brandon put that stuff in his mouth on her vagina which made her vagina hurt and Brandon put his finger in her vagina” and that “Brandon put his finger in her vagina which made her feel bad and Brandon spit on her vagina and put his penis on her at Uncle Mike’s.” Following an adjudicatory hearing, the circuit court found him guilty and sentenced him to the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice for an indeterminate period not to exceed the period for which an adult could be committed for the same act, or the date of his twenty-first birthday, whichever came first. The appellate court affirmed. The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed, holding that error in admitting Detective Hogren’s hearsay testimony was cumulative of "overwhelming' properly admitted testimonial evidence and did not contribute to the adjudication of guilt.View "In re Brandon P." on Justia Law

Bingham, then in her late teens, committed aggressive acts toward adults and children, including grabbing and kissing. She was declared a sexually dangerous person under the Sexually Dangerous Persons Act, 725 ILCS 205/1.01. The Director of the Illinois Department of Corrections was appointed as her guardian. She was to remain committed “until or unless [she] is recovered and released.” The appellate court reversed. The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed. The limited evidence was insufficient to establish that it was substantially probable that Bingham would commit future sex offenses. A single incident, in which she attempted to grab a woman’s breast area through her shirt, was insufficient to establish that substantial probability. Another incident, involving Bingham touching the buttocks of 17-year-old Katie C, was not clearly intentional; Katie C. acknowledged that Bingham only touched her one time and stopped as soon as Katie C. asked her to do so. There was no evidence that the incident was done as a result of “arousal or gratification of sexual needs or desires.” Without evidence of either an act of sexual assault or acts of child molestation, the state failed to prove propensities toward acts of sexual assault or sexual molestation of children.View "People v. Bingham" on Justia Law

In 1999, Appellant, his codefendant, and two accomplices robbed the occupants of a vehicle at gunpoint. In the course of the robbery, Appellant shot and killed the victim. At the time, Appellant was seventeen years of age. In 2002, Appellant was convicted of second-degree murder and related offenses. He received a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, plus a term of imprisonment. On direct appeal, the Superior Court affirmed; the Supreme Court denied Appellant’s petition for allowance of appeal; and Appellant did not seek discretionary review in the United States Supreme Court. Appellant then timely filed a post-conviction petition claiming, inter alia, that the life-without-parole sentence violated his rights under the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution, as extended to the States via the Fourteenth Amendment. Specifically, the issue before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in this case was whether “Miller v. Alabama,” (132 S. Ct. 2455 (2012)) applied retroactively to Appellant’s 2002 judgment of sentence, which became final in 2005. The United States Supreme Court issued the Miller decision in June 2012, rendering Pennsylvania’s mandatory scheme of life imprisonment for first- and second-degree murder unconstitutional, as applied to offenders under the age of eighteen at the time of their crimes. Significantly, as pertaining to this case, the Miller majority did not specifically address the question of whether its holding applied to judgments of sentence for prisoners, such as Appellant, which already were final as of the time of the decision. The Pennsylvania Court applied settled principles of appellate review, and found nothing in Appellant’s arguments persuaded it that Miller’s proscription of the imposition of mandatory life-without-parole sentences upon offenders under the age of eighteen at the time their crimes were committed must be extended to those whose judgments of sentence were final as of the time of Miller’s announcement. View "Pennsylvania v. Cunningham" on Justia Law

A.S. was sentenced as an aggravated juvenile offender to two years' commitment to the Department of Human Services, suspended on condition of successful completion of two years' probation. The district court vacated the sentence and remanded for resentencing, holding that 19-2-601 C.R.S. (2013) authorized only commitment to DHS, and did not grant a court discretion to grant probation. Upon review of the applicable statute, the Supreme Court concluded 19-2-601 does indeed grant a sentencing court discretion. View "A.S. v. Colorado" on Justia Law

Korsiba Arot was charged in district court with three counts of gross sexual imposition for incidents that occurred in the summer of 2011, the latest of which occurred in August, 2011. Arot moved to dismiss the criminal charges arguing the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case because Arot was not eighteen at the time of the incidents. The district court found the State failed to prove by the preponderance of the evidence that Arot was eighteen at the time of the incidents. The charges were dismissed. The State appealed the dismissal of charges. Finding no error in the dismissal, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "North Dakota v. Arot" on Justia Law

Movant was convicted of conspiracy to traffic in controlled substances and sentenced to a mandatory term of life imprisonment without parole. He was 17 years old when the conspiracy began and the conspiracy continued until he had turned 18. After the Supreme Court issued its decision in Miller v. Alabama, movant filed a motion under 28 U.S.C. 2255(h) seeking authorization to file a successive section 2255 motion. The court denied the motion, concluding that, even assuming that movant qualified as a juvenile offender, his proposed motion would necessarily rely on a right that became available to him in 2010 with the Supreme Court's decision in Graham v. Florida, which held that sentencing a juvenile who did not commit a homicide to life imprisonment without parole violated the Eighth Amendment, and not on Miller, which extended the Graham rule to prohibit mandatory life-without-parole sentences for juveniles convicted of committing homicide. Because Graham was decided more than one year before movant filed his section 2255(h) motion, the successive section 2255 motion he sought leave to file would be barred by the applicable one year statute of limitations under 28 U.S.C. 2255(f)(3). View "In re: Tadd Vassell" on Justia Law

Petitioners Ronald Watts and Kevin Aguirre were charged by way of complaints issued in district court with criminal offenses that Petitioners allegedly committed when they were each seventeen years old. The Governor subsequently signed St. 2013 ch. 84 (Act), which extended the juvenile court’s jurisdiction to persons who were seventeen years old at the time of committing an offense. Petitioners moved to dismiss the district court charges against them pursuant to the Act, claiming that the district courts lacked jurisdiction over them because they were seventeen at the time the alleged offenses occurred and when the criminal proceedings had begun. The Supreme Judicial Court denied Petitioners’ motions, holding that the Act does not apply retroactively to cases involving juveniles who were seventeen years of age at the time of the alleged offense and whose criminal cases in the superior court or district court were begun prior to, and were pending on, the effective date of the Act. View "Watts v. Commonwealth" on Justia Law

Defendants in these cases were both seventeen-year-old offenders who were convicted of special circumstance murder and sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole under Cal. Penal Code 190.5(b). After Defendants were sentenced, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Miller v. Alabama. On review, the California Supreme Court held (1) section 190.5(b), properly construed, confers discretion upon a trial court to sentence a juvenile convicted of special circumstance murder to life without parole, with no presumption in favor of life without parole; (2) Miller requires a trial court, in exercising its sentencing discretion, to consider the distinctive attributes of youth before imposing life without parole on a juvenile offender; (3) section 190.5(b) does not violate the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because it authorizes and requires consideration of the distinctive attributes of youth highlighted in Miller, once the statute is understood not to impose a presumption in favor of life without parole; and (4) because the trial courts in these cases sentenced Defendants without awareness of the full scope of their discretion conferred by section 190.5(b) and without the guidance set forth in Miller, the cases must be remanded for resentencing. View "People v. Gutierrez" on Justia Law

Petitioner, who was fifteen at the time of the crimes, was charged as an adult with nine felonies. Prior to trial, Petitioner filed a motion to transfer his case from district court to juvenile court, which the district court denied. Petitioner subsequently filed a petition for writ of review, claiming that the district court improperly placed the burden on him to establish that the case should be transferred to juvenile court. The Supreme Court granted the review. The Court then reversed, holding that the district court erred in failing to assign the burden of persuasion to the State to establish that the case should not be transferred to juvenile court. Remanded.View "JB v. State" on Justia Law