LITTLE ROCK — A state law that leaves it up to prosecutors to decide whether to try some youths as adults withstood a constitutional challenge by a minor referred to as “C.B.” who is accused of escaping from a detention facility and killing a guard in the process.
The state Supreme Court ruled that the law is constitutional and that the Jefferson County Circuit Court did not err in applying it to C.B. and refusing to transfer his case to juvenile court.
According to the court’s unanimous opinion Thursday, on Jan. 30, 2010, 16-yearold C.B. and two others escaped from the Jack Jones Juvenile Justice Center in Pine Bluff. C.B. was involved in attacks on two security guards during the escape, and one of them died.
After escaping, C.B. is alleged to have stolen a vehicle at a gas station to make a getaway.
He and another youth, N.D., were apprehended in Fort Smith in February 2010. An 18-year old, Brandon Henderson, was found the next day in Oklahoma.
C.B. was charged with fel- ony counts of capital murder, aggravated robbery, first-degree escape, theft of property, battery as well as misdemeanor theft.
Arkansas Code Annotated 9-27-318 gives a prosecutor discretion to try a case in juvenile or adult criminal court if it involves a youth who is at least 16 when he engages in conduct that would be a felony if committed by an adult.
C.B. argued that the law is unconstitutional because it gives prosecuting attorneys too much power to determine where minors should be tried and violates the separation-ofpowers doctrine, which prohibits the executive branch of government, which includes prosecutors, from exercising the powers of the judicial or legislative branches.
Amendment 80 to the Arkansas Constitution dictates that rules of “pleading, practice and procedure” are the province of the Supreme Court.
In 2009 the court held that setting court procedure is a power that belongs exclusively to the judicial branch of government.
“If any legislation bypasses our rules of pleading, practice and procedure by setting up a procedure of its own, then it violates the separation of powers doctrine,” the court ruled then.
But the juvenile-transfer law is not a procedural rule that would infringe on the court’s power, the justices ruled.
Rather, it is “substantive law that is rooted in public policy,” Chief Justice Jim Hannah wrote in the opinion.
“To hold that the General Assembly’s enactment of section 9-27-318 was an impediment to this court’s rule-making authority would be to interfere with the Legislature’s policy-making authority. This we will not do,” he wrote.
Hannah wrote that being treated as a minor is not an inherent right, and the Legislature’s decision to give prosecutors the authority to try some minors as adults was not an “arbitrary” or “irrational” move, but one made in response to an increase in violent crimes committed by minors.
“The Legislature was entitled to place restrictions or qualifications on the rights afforded to juveniles,” he wrote.
According to a 2011 report by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 15 states have laws giving prosecutors discretion over how to try minors.
C.B. also argued that in his case, the circuit court’s denial of his motion to have the case transferred to juvenile court was an error.
There are several factors for a court to consider when deciding whether to try a minor as an adult, but the Supreme Court has held that the seriousness and violent nature of an alleged crime is enough to base the decision on.
C.B. argued that he lacked the culpability to plan the escape. Dr. Albert Kittrell, the medical director at New Beginnings Behavioral Health in Little Rock and a contract psychiatrist at the Arkansas Department of Correction, told the circuit court that C.B. had a mood disorder similar to bipolar disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and borderline intellectual functioning. Kittrell also said he believed C.B. was easily influenced by others.
The circuit court found that C.B. placed a playing card in the locking mechanism of his cell door to keep it from locking. C.B. opened the door and ambushed security guard Leonard Wall while he was doing a bed check, beating him to death.
Kittrell testified that he could not say with certainty whether C.B. was likely to be rehabilitated through any youthful-offender program.
The circuit court also found that given C.B.’s history, there was no program available likely to rehabilitate him by his 21st birthday.
The Supreme Court ruled that there was “clear and convincing evidence” to support the circuit court’s ruling, and that the lower court did not clearly err in agreeing to let the case be transferred to the circuit court’s criminal division.
At the Supreme Court, the case is 11-1163, C.B. v. State.
Arkansas, Pages 11 on 05/25/2012