Also known as: juvenile delinquencies · juvenile delinquent · juvenile delinquents · juvenile offender · juvenile crime
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A civil proceeding in which a juvenile court adjudicates a child for conduct that would constitute a crime if committed by an adult. The proceeding focuses on treatment and rehabilitation rather than punishment.
Fifteen-year-old Maya faces a juvenile petition alleging computer fraud after investigators link after-hours office access to her. The court applies a preponderance standard and adjudicates her delinquent. On appeal the adjudication is reversed because due process requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every element when the petition rests on criminal conduct.
Seventeen-year-old Jamal is adjudicated delinquent for arson that destroys a warehouse but causes no deaths. The court imposes life without parole. The sentence is vacated because the Eighth Amendment forbids that punishment for a juvenile in a non-homicide case.
Fourteen-year-old John is adjudicated delinquent after selling magazines ruled obscene under the prevailing test. The adjudication stands because the materials meet the constitutional definition of obscenity even though the buyer was also a minor.
Roth conducted a business in New York in the publication and sale of books, photographs and magazines. He used circulars and advertising matter to solicit sales and was convicted by a jury in the District Court for the Southern District of New York upon 4 counts of a 26-count indictment charging him with mailing obscene circulars and advertising, and an obscene book, in violation of the federal obscenity statute. His conviction was affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Alberts conducted a mail-order business from Los Angeles. He was convicted by the Judge of the Municipal Court of the Beverly Hills Judicial District, having waived a jury trial, under a misdemeanor complaint which charged him with lewdly keeping for sale obscene and indecent books, and with writing, composing and publishing an obscene advertisement of them, in violation of the California Penal Code. The conviction was affirmed by the Appellate Department of the Superior Court of the State of California in and for the County of Los Angeles. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in the Roth case and noted probable jurisdiction in the Alberts case.
View caseSixteen-year-old Jillian is adjudicated delinquent for engaging in sexual intercourse with a fifteen-year-old male. The court rejects her equal-protection challenge because the statute may constitutionally treat the older participant as delinquent regardless of gender.
The petitioner, Michael M., was seventeen and one-half years old when, on June 3, 1978, he and two friends approached Sharon, a sixteen-and-one-half-year-old female, and her sister at a bus stop. Petitioner and Sharon had been drinking. They moved away from the others and began to kiss. After petitioner struck Sharon in the face for rebuffing his initial advances, she submitted to sexual intercourse with him. In July 1978, a complaint was filed in the Municipal Court of Sonoma County. The complaint alleged that petitioner had unlawful sexual intercourse with a female under the age of eighteen in violation of section 261.5 of the California Penal Code. Prior to trial, petitioner sought to set aside the information on the ground that the statute unlawfully discriminated on the basis of gender. The trial court denied the motion, and petitioner was convicted after a jury trial. The California Court of Appeal denied petitioner's request for relief.
View caseThirteen-year-old June is adjudicated delinquent for repeated thefts. The same conduct later supports a separate petition to terminate her parents' rights. The delinquency adjudication supplies clear and convincing evidence that the parents failed to control her behavior.
In November 1973, after incidents reflecting parental neglect, respondent Kramer, Commissioner of the Ulster County Department of Social Services, initiated a neglect proceeding under the Family Court Act and removed Tina Santosky from her natural home. About ten months later, he removed John III and placed him with foster parents. On the day John was taken, Annie Santosky gave birth to a third child, Jed, who was transferred to a foster home three days later on the ground that immediate removal was necessary to avoid imminent danger to his life or health. In October 1978, respondent petitioned the Ulster County Family Court to terminate petitioners' parental rights in the three children. Petitioners challenged the constitutionality of the fair preponderance of the evidence standard specified in the Family Court Act. The Family Court Judge rejected this constitutional challenge, weighed the evidence under the statutory standard, acknowledged that the Santoskys had maintained contact with their children but found those visits at best superficial and devoid of any real emotional content, decided that the agency had made diligent efforts to encourage and strengthen the parental relationship, concluded that the Santoskys were incapable even with public assistance of planning for the future of their children, and after a dispositional hearing ruled that the best interests of the three children required permanent termination of the Santoskys' custody. Petitioners appealed, again contesting the constitutionality of the standard of proof. The New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, affirmed, holding application of the preponderance-of-the-evidence standard proper and constitutional on the ground that it recognizes and seeks to balance rights possessed by the child with those of the natural parents. The New York Court of Appeals then dismissed petitioners' appeal upon the ground that no substantial constitutional question is directly involved. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider petitioners' constitutional claim.
View caseFourteen-year-old Julia is searched at school and found with cigarettes. The evidence supports a delinquency petition for possession. The search is upheld because school officials need only reasonable suspicion rather than probable cause.
On March 7, 1980, a teacher at Piscataway High School in Middlesex County, New Jersey, discovered two girls, including fourteen-year-old freshman T. L. O., smoking in a school lavatory in violation of school rules. The teacher escorted the girls to the principal’s office, where they met with Assistant Vice Principal Theodore Choplick. When questioned, T. L. O. denied smoking in the lavatory. Choplick then took T. L. O. into his private office and demanded to inspect her purse. Upon opening the purse, Choplick found a pack of cigarettes and a package of cigarette rolling papers. Suspecting drug involvement, he conducted a thorough search of the purse, uncovering a small amount of marijuana, a pipe, empty plastic bags, a substantial quantity of one-dollar bills, an index card listing students who owed T. L. O. money, and two letters implicating her in marijuana dealing. Choplick turned this evidence over to the police, and T. L. O. was charged with delinquency based on possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. T. L. O. moved to suppress the evidence from her purse, arguing that the search violated the Fourth Amendment. The Juvenile Court denied the motion to suppress. The Appellate Division affirmed the denial of the suppression motion but remanded on other grounds. The New Jersey Supreme Court reversed, holding the search unreasonable and ordering suppression of the evidence. The State of New Jersey petitioned for certiorari, which the United States Supreme Court granted. The Court initially focused on the exclusionary rule but later ordered reargument on the Fourth Amendment standard applicable to school searches.
View caseDue process requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every element. The civil label of the proceeding does not reduce the constitutional burden when the petition rests on criminal acts.
No. The Eighth Amendment categorically prohibits that sentence for juvenile offenders in non-homicide cases.
No. The Sixth Amendment jury-trial right does not extend to juvenile adjudications.
The delinquency proceeding is civil and aims at treatment rather than punishment, although constitutional protections such as proof beyond a reasonable doubt still apply when the petition alleges criminal conduct.
…387 U. S. 1 (1967). The present case draws in question the validity of a New York statute that permits a determination of juvenile delinquency, founded on a charge of criminal conduct, to be made on a standard of proof that is less rigorous than that which would obtain had the accused been tried for the same conduct in an ordinary…