TOPEKA—Saying the Kansas Juvenile Justice Code has become “more akin to an adult prosecution,” the state Supreme Court today ruled 6-1 that juveniles have a constitutional right to a jury trial. (No. 96,197: In the Matter of L.M.)
The decision applies to all juvenile cases pending on appeal or not yet final as of today’s filing. The ruling came in an appeal brought in a Finney County case in which a 16-year-old was found guilty as a juvenile offender on one count of aggravated sexual battery and one count of being a minor in possession of alcohol. The defendant, who is identified in the court briefs only as L.M., filed a motion asking for a jury trial, but was denied by the district court.
The charges arose from the defendant’s making a sexually suggestive comment and forcing a kiss on a woman who was walking home on a street in his neighborhood. He was found guilty as charged and subsequently placed on probation until he was 20 years old. In addition, the district court ordered him to complete sex offender treatment and register as a sex offender.
Chief Justice Kay McFarland was the lone dissenter in the case; however, Justice Marla J. Luckert, in a concurring opinion said she would find the constitutional right arose from Section 5 of the Kansas Constitution, which provides that the “right to a jury trial shall be inviolate.” Her analysis would have afforded a jury trial only to juveniles 14 years of age or older. The majority opinion, which was authored by Justice Eric S. Rosen, said the right to a jury trial applies to all juveniles and arises from the 6th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and Section 10 of the Kansas Constitution Bill of Rights.
Quoting Section 10 of the Kansas Constitution Bill of Rights, Justice Rosen wrote: “In all prosecutions, the accused shall be allowed to appear and defend in person, or by counsel…[and have] a speedy public trial by an impartial jury” in the county where the offense is alleged to have been committed.
The majority held that changes to the Kansas Juvenile Justice Code (KJJC) since 1984, the last time the Kansas Supreme Court addressed the issue, “have eroded the benevolent, child-cognizant, and rehabilitative” and paternalistic nature of the code that distinguished it from the adult criminal system.
“Because the Kansas Juvenile Justice Code has become more akin to an adult criminal prosecution, it is held that juveniles henceforth have a constitutional right to a jury trial under the 6th and 14th Amendments,” the Court ruled.
The majority cited numerous changes to the code over the past 24 years, saying the changes have made juvenile court prosecutions more like adult prosecutions, including changes from “non-punitive terminology” to “criminal terminology” similar to that in the adult criminal code, the alignment of the KJJC sentencing provisions with the adult sentencing guidelines and the removal of other paternalistic protections, such as some confidentiality restrictions that were afforded juvenile defendants.
“While there is wide variability in the juvenile offender laws throughout the country, it nevertheless seems apparent to us that the KJJC, in its tilt towards applying adult standards of criminal procedure and sentencing, removed the paternalistic protections previously accorded juveniles while continuing to deny those juveniles the constitutional right to a jury trial,” the majority held. “Although we do not find total support from the courts in some of our sister states, we are undaunted in our belief that juveniles are entitled to the right to a jury trial guaranteed to all citizens under the 6th and 14th Amendments to the United States Constitution,” the Court concluded.
Chief Justice McFarland said she respectfully dissents from the majority conclusion that juvenile offenders are now constitutionally entitled to a jury trial. “I disagree. Although it cannot be disputed that in the 20-plus years since [the Court’s last decision on it] the juvenile system has become more punitive and has incorporated some of the terminology and mechanisms of the adult criminal system, the majority overstates and overemphasizes the changes while ignoring the many features of the current system that remain consistent with the benevolent, protective, rehabilitative, child-cognizant characteristics that distinguish the juvenile system from the criminal system,” she wrote in her dissent.
She said the new system of juvenile justice in Kansas “continues to further the goals that have always characterized the modern juvenile system: protection of the public and rehabilitation,” which she said are not incompatible. “Given the fact that the juvenile system must deal with serious, violent, and habitual offenders, it is entirely appropriate the juvenile system balance rehabilitation with protection of the public.”
The chief justice said the majority opinion provided no “persuasive authority” from other jurisdictions and contained “less than comprehensive analysis of the current system” in making its conclusion that the “Kansas juvenile justice system is the essential equivalent of the adult criminal justice system and, thus, the right to a jury must be afforded.”
The case will now be returned to Finney County where the defendant will have a right to a jury trial, and the state statute making jury trials for juveniles discretionary has been ruled unconstitutional, under today’s decision.