Case Title: State v. Aalim

Citation: 2017-Ohio-2956

Docket Number: 

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2017-05-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
v. Aalim, Slip Opinion No. 2017-Ohio-2956.] 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2017-OHIO-2956 
THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. AALIM, APPELLANT. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State v. Aalim, Slip Opinion No. 2017-Ohio-2956.] 
Juvenile procedure—Due process—Equal protection—Mandatory transfer of 
juveniles to general division of common pleas court does not violate 
juveniles’ rights to due process or equal protection under Article I, Sections 
2 and 16 of Ohio Constitution or Fourteenth Amendment to United States 
Constitution—Due-process provisions of both constitutions predate 
creation of juvenile courts and therefore cannot have created substantive 
right to amenability hearing—Appellant’s mandatory transfer satisfied 
fundamental fairness because juvenile court issued decision stating its 
reasons for transfer after conducting hearing at which appellant was 
represented by counsel—Juveniles are not a suspect class under either 
federal or Ohio’s Equal Protection Clause—Mandatory transfer is 
rationally related to legitimate governmental purpose of increased 
punishments for serious juvenile offenders—Motion for reconsideration 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
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granted and court of appeals’ judgment upholding trial court’s denial of 
appellant’s motion to dismiss his indictment affirmed. 
(No. 2015-0677—Submitted February 7, 2017—Decided May 25, 2017.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Montgomery County, 
No. 26249, 2015-Ohio-892. 
ON MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION. 
_________________ 
 
KENNEDY, J. 
{¶ 1} This court has the authority to grant motions for reconsideration filed 
under S.Ct.Prac.R. 18.02 in order to “correct decisions which, upon reflection, are 
deemed to have been made in error.”  State ex rel. Huebner v. W. Jefferson Village 
Council, 75 Ohio St.3d 381, 383, 662 N.E.2d 339 (1995).  In seeking 
reconsideration of this court’s decision in State v. Aalim, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-
Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __ (“Aalim I”), the state argues that the court failed to 
consider Article IV, Section 4(B) of the Ohio Constitution, which grants the 
General Assembly exclusive authority to define the jurisdiction of the courts of 
common pleas.  We agree. 
{¶ 2} Article IV, Section 4(B) of the Ohio Constitution grants exclusive 
authority to the General Assembly to allocate certain subject matters to the 
exclusive original jurisdiction of specified divisions of the courts of common pleas.  
State v. Wilson, 73 Ohio St.3d 40, 42, 652 N.E.2d 196 (1995).  The General 
Assembly exercised that authority when it vested in the juvenile courts “exclusive 
jurisdiction over children alleged to be delinquent for committing acts that would 
constitute a crime if committed by an adult.”  In re M.P., 124 Ohio St.3d 445, 2010-
Ohio-599, 923 N.E.2d 584, ¶ 11, citing R.C. 2151.23(A).  However, as part of 
Ohio’s response to rising juvenile crime, in 1996, the General Assembly enacted 
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former R.C. 2151.26, now R.C. 2152.12,1 State v. Hanning, 89 Ohio St.3d 86, 89, 
728 N.E.2d 1059 (2000), citing Am.Sub.H.B. No. 1, 146 Ohio Laws, Part I, 1, 18, 
creating “a narrow exception to the general rule that juvenile courts have exclusive 
subject matter jurisdiction over any case involving a child,” Wilson at 43.  Under 
R.C. 2152.12, a juvenile who has committed a qualifying offense and who meets 
certain age requirements is automatically removed from the jurisdiction of the 
juvenile division and transferred to adult court. 
{¶ 3} This court’s ruling in Aalim I declared that the Ohio Constitution 
requires that a juvenile who is subject to mandatory bindover receive an 
amenability hearing.  Aalim I at ¶ 25.  Implicit in Aalim I is the conclusion that a 
juvenile-division judge has discretion in deciding whether to transfer to adult court 
a juvenile in a case in which the juvenile is 16 or 17 years old and there is probable 
cause to believe that the juvenile committed an offense outlined in R.C. 
2152.10(A)(2)(b).  Our decision in Aalim I  therefore usurped the General 
Assembly’s exclusive constitutional authority to define the jurisdiction of the courts 
of common pleas by impermissibly allowing a juvenile-division judge discretion to 
veto the legislature’s grant of jurisdiction to the general division of a court of 
common pleas over this limited class of juvenile offenders.  Therefore, we grant the 
state’s motion for reconsideration. 
{¶ 4} Having granted reconsideration, we turn to the original questions 
presented and determine that the mandatory bindover of certain juveniles to adult 
court under R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b) does not violate the Due 
Course of Law Clause or the Equal Protection Clause of the Ohio Constitution and 
the analogous provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution. 
 
 
                                                 
1 In 2000, R.C. 2151.26 was amended and recodified as R.C. 2152.12.  See 2000 Sub.S.B. No. 179. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
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I.  CASE BACKGROUND 
{¶ 5} On December 3, 2013, appellee, the state of Ohio, filed a complaint 
in the Juvenile Division of the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas, 
alleging that appellant, Matthew I. Aalim, engaged in conduct that would be 
considered aggravated robbery in violation of R.C. 2911.01(A)(1) if committed by 
an adult.  The complaint also contained a firearm specification.  The state filed a 
motion to transfer Aalim, requesting that the juvenile court relinquish jurisdiction 
and transfer him to the general division of the common pleas court to be tried as an 
adult pursuant to Juv.R. 30, R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b), and R.C. 2152.12(A)(1)(b). 
{¶ 6} On January 10, 2014, Aalim appeared before the Juvenile Division of 
the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas for a hearing on whether the 
juvenile court should relinquish jurisdiction over Aalim’s case.  At the hearing, 
Aalim was represented by counsel and his mother was also present.  After the 
hearing, the juvenile court issued an order and entry finding that Aalim was 16 
years old at the time of the alleged offense and that there was probable cause to 
believe that he had committed the conduct alleged in the complaint, including the 
firearm specification.  Based on these findings, the juvenile court recognized that it 
no longer had jurisdiction and transferred the case to the general division of the 
common 
pleas 
court 
as 
required 
under 
R.C. 
2152.10(A)(2)(b) 
and 
2152.12(A)(1)(b).  An indictment was issued charging Aalim with two counts of 
aggravated robbery in violation of R.C. 2911.01(A)(1) with accompanying firearm 
specifications.  The two counts of aggravated robbery charged in the indictment 
reflected the fact that there were two victims of the alleged conduct. 
{¶ 7} Aalim filed a motion to dismiss the indictment and transfer his case 
back to juvenile court, arguing that mandatory bindover of juveniles pursuant to 
R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b) violates their rights to due process and 
equal protection as well as the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishments 
under both the United States and Ohio Constitutions.  The trial court overruled the 
January Term, 2017 
 
5
motion, and Aalim entered pleas of no contest to the two counts of aggravated 
robbery.  The court accepted the pleas, dismissed the firearm specifications 
consistently with a plea agreement that the parties had reached, and sentenced 
Aalim to concurrent prison terms of four years on each count. 
{¶ 8} The Second District Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s 
judgment, rejecting Aalim’s challenges to the mandatory-bindover statutes.  
Rejecting Aalim’s due-process argument, the court of appeals relied on a previous 
decision to hold that the mandatory-bindover scheme of R.C. 2152.12 comports 
with fundamental concepts of due process.  2015-Ohio-892, ¶ 7-9, citing State v. 
Brookshire, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 25853, 2014-Ohio-1971, ¶ 30.  It also 
rejected Aalim’s equal-protection argument, concluding that the singling out of 
juveniles aged 16 and 17 charged with serious offenses is rationally related to the 
legitimate governmental purpose of protecting society and reducing violent crime 
by juveniles.  Id. at ¶ 13-17, citing State v. Anderson, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 
25689, 2014-Ohio-4245, ¶ 72-75.  Aalim also raised a cruel-and-unusual-
punishments challenge, which the Second District rejected.  2015-Ohio-892 at  
¶ 19-21.  He has not included his cruel-and-unusual-punishments argument in this 
appeal. 
{¶ 9} We accepted jurisdiction over two propositions of law, which ask us 
to hold that R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b) violate juveniles’ rights 
to due process and equal protection as guaranteed by the United States and Ohio 
Constitutions.  See 143 Ohio St.3d 1498, 2015-Ohio-4468, 39 N.E.3d 1270.  On 
December 22, 2016, we issued an opinion reversing the Second District’s judgment 
and declaring that the mandatory-bindover statutes were unconstitutional because 
they violated juveniles’ right to due process as guaranteed by Article I, Section 16 
of the Ohio Constitution.  Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d 
__.  On January 3, 2017, the state moved for reconsideration.  We grant the motion 
for reconsideration, which we address in this opinion. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
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II.  LEGAL ANALYSIS 
{¶ 10} Aalim presents facial due-process and equal-protection challenges to 
R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b).  His arguments regarding due process 
are (1) that fundamental fairness requires that every juvenile receive an opportunity 
to demonstrate a capacity to change, (2) that youth must always be considered as a 
mitigating—not aggravating—factor, (3) that the irrebuttable presumption of 
transfer contained in the statutes is fundamentally unfair, and (4) that juveniles have 
a substantive due-process right to have their youth and its attendant characteristics 
taken into account during a bindover proceeding. 
{¶ 11} In support of his equal-protection claim, Aalim argues (1) that the 
mandatory-bindover statutes create classes of similarly situated juveniles who are 
treated differently based solely on their ages, (2) that a juvenile’s status as a juvenile 
is a suspect class for purposes of equal-protection analysis, and (3) that the age-
based distinctions in the mandatory-bindover statutes are not rationally related to 
the purpose of juvenile-delinquency proceedings. 
{¶ 12} The state counters that the mandatory-bindover statutes satisfy 
constitutional due-process requirements because they provide for all the required 
procedural safeguards, such as the right to notice, the right to counsel, the right to 
confront and cross-examine witnesses, the right to introduce evidence on one’s own 
behalf, the privilege against self-incrimination, and protection from double 
jeopardy.  Additionally, the state argues that substantive due process does not give 
Aalim the right to an amenability hearing.  The state also argues that Aalim’s equal-
protection challenge fails because the mandatory-bindover statutes do not infringe 
upon a fundamental right or affect a suspect class and are rationally related to a 
legitimate governmental interest. 
{¶ 13} R.C. 2152.10(A) sets forth which juvenile cases are subject to 
mandatory bindover and provides: 
 
January Term, 2017 
 
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(A)  A child who is alleged to be a delinquent child is eligible 
for mandatory transfer and shall be transferred as provided in section 
2152.12 of the Revised Code in any of the following circumstances: 
(1)  The child is charged with a category one offense and 
either of the following apply: 
(a)  The child was sixteen years of age or older at the time of 
the act charged. 
(b)  The child was fourteen or fifteen years of age at the time 
of the act charged and previously was adjudicated a delinquent child 
for committing an act that is a category one or category two offense 
and was committed to the legal custody of the department of youth 
services upon the basis of that adjudication. 
 (2)  The child is charged with a category two offense, other 
than a violation of section 2905.01 of the Revised Code, the child 
was sixteen years of age or older at the time of the commission of 
the act charged, and either or both of the following apply: 
(a)  The child previously was adjudicated a delinquent child 
for committing an act that is a category one or a category two offense 
and was committed to the legal custody of the department of youth 
services on the basis of that adjudication. 
(b) The child is alleged to have had a firearm on or about the 
child’s person or under the child’s control while committing the act 
charged and to have displayed the firearm, brandished the firearm, 
indicated possession of the firearm, or used the firearm to facilitate 
the commission of the act charged. 
 
Aggravated robbery is a category-two offense, R.C. 2152.02(BB)(1), and Aalim 
was 16 years old at the time the offense was committed.  Because he was also 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
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charged with a firearm specification, automatic transfer was required.  R.C. 
2152.10(A)(2)(b).  A juvenile court must transfer a juvenile to adult court 
automatically under these circumstances if “there is probable cause to believe that 
the child committed the act charged.”  R.C. 2152.12(A)(1)(b)(ii). 
A.  Due Process and Due Course of Law 
{¶ 14} Aalim’s due-process argument fits into two categories.  First, Aalim 
claims that juveniles have a substantive-due-process right to an individualized 
determination by a juvenile-division judge in an amenability hearing.  Second, 
Aalim argues that the General Assembly’s decision to grant jurisdiction over a 
special class of juvenile offenders to the general division of the common pleas 
courts violates the “fundamental fairness” requirement of Ohio’s Due Course of 
Law Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. 
{¶ 15} Since 1887, this court has equated the Due Course of Law Clause in 
Article I, Section 16 of the Ohio Constitution with the Due Process Clause of the 
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  See Adler v. Whitbeck, 
44 Ohio St. 539, 569, 9 N.E. 672 (1887).  See also State ex rel. Heller v. Miller, 61 
Ohio St.2d 6, 8, 399 N.E.2d 66 (1980) (stating that Ohio courts may look to 
decisions of the United States Supreme Court to give meaning to Ohio’s Due 
Course of Law Clause).  We have reaffirmed this view as recently as last year.  See 
State v. Hand, 149 Ohio St.3d 94, 2016-Ohio-5504, 73 N.E.3d 448, ¶ 11 (“The ‘due 
course of law’ provision is the equivalent of the ‘due process of law’ provision in 
the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution”), citing Direct 
Plumbing Supply Co. v. Dayton, 138 Ohio St. 540, 544, 38 N.E.2d 70 (1941).  
Additionally, we have considered United States Supreme Court decisions “as 
giving the true meaning of the guaranties of the Ohio Bill of Rights.”  Direct 
Plumbing Supply at 545. 
 
 
January Term, 2017 
 
9
1.  Substantive Due Process 
{¶ 16} The Supreme Court’s “established method of substantive-due-
process analysis has two primary features.”  Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 
702, 720, 117 S.Ct. 2258, 138 L.Ed.2d 772 (1997).  First, the court has “observed 
that the Due Process Clause specially protects those fundamental rights and liberties 
which are, objectively, ‘deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition’ * * * 
and ‘implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,’ such that ‘neither liberty nor justice 
would exist if they were sacrificed.’ ”  Id. at 720-721, quoting Moore v. E. 
Cleveland, 431 U.S. 494, 503, 97 S.Ct. 1932, 52 L.Ed.2d 531 (1977) (plurality 
opinion), and Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 326, 58 S.Ct. 149, 82 L.Ed. 288 
(1937).  Second, the court has “required in substantive-due-process cases a ‘careful 
description’ of the asserted fundamental liberty interest.”  Id. at 721, quoting Reno 
v. Flores, 507 U.S. 292, 302, 113 S.Ct. 1439, 123 L.E.2d 1 (1993).  The court has 
cautioned against using the Fourteenth Amendment to define new fundamental 
liberty interests without “concrete examples involving fundamental rights found to 
be deeply rooted in our legal tradition.”  Id. at 722.  The court has observed that 
“[t]his approach tends to rein in the subjective elements that are necessarily present 
in due-process judicial review.”  Id. 
{¶ 17} Aalim’s substantive-due-process argument can be disposed of in 
short order. Ohio’s Due Course of Law Clause was adopted in 1851, and the 
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which contains the 
federal Due Process Clause, was ratified in 1868.  The first juvenile court in the 
United States was established in 1899 in Cook County, Illinois, and the first 
juvenile court in Ohio was the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court, established in 
1902.  Supreme Court of Ohio, Desktop Guide for Juvenile Court Clerks 1-1 
(2007).  It was not until 1937 that the General Assembly established juvenile courts 
throughout the state, see Am.S.B. No. 268, 117 Ohio Laws 520, 522, and the 
amenability hearing was not added to the juvenile-court system until 1969, see 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
10 
Am.H.B. No. 320, 133 Ohio Laws, Part II, 2040, 2049.  Because Ohio’s Due Course 
of Law Clause and the federal Due Process Clause both predate the creation of 
juvenile courts in Ohio and throughout the United States, these provisions cannot 
have created a substantive right to a specific juvenile-court proceeding.  Therefore, 
an amenability hearing cannot be “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and 
tradition” and “ ‘implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,’ ” Moore at 503, quoting 
Palko at 326. 
{¶ 18} Justice O’Neill’s dissenting opinion contends that the United States 
Supreme Court has refused to rely solely on historical analysis when interpreting 
the Fourteenth Amendment’s substantive-due-process protection.  Dissenting 
opinion, O’Neill, J., at ¶ 117 (“ ‘Neither the Bill of Rights nor the specific practices 
of States at the time of the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment marks the outer 
limits of the substantive sphere of liberty which the Fourteenth Amendment 
protects’ ”), quoting Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 
505 U.S. 833, 847-848, 112 S.Ct. 2791, 120 L.Ed.2d 674 (1992).  However, his 
dissent ignores the fact that since Casey, the court has been “ ‘reluctant to expand 
the concept of substantive due process,’ ” Albright v. Oliver, 510 U.S. 266, 271, 
114 S.Ct. 807, 127 L.Ed.2d 114 (1994) (plurality opinion), quoting Collins v. 
Harker Hts., 503 U.S. 115, 125, 112 S.Ct. 1061, 117 L.Ed.2d 261 (1992), and has 
continually limited substantive-due-process protections to matters relating to 
“marriage, family, procreation, and the right to bodily integrity,” id. at 272, citing 
Casey at 847-849; see also Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 578, 123 S.Ct. 2472, 
156 L.Ed.2d 508 (2003) (relying on Casey to conclude that the Fourteenth 
Amendment protects the right of two consenting adults of the same sex to engage 
in sexual conduct); Obergefell v. Hodges, __ U.S. __, 135 S.Ct. 2584, 2599, 192 
L.Ed.2d 609 (2015) (the right to personal choice regarding marriage is inherent in 
the concept of individual autonomy protected by substantive due process under the 
Fourteenth Amendment).  Compare Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 727, 117 S.Ct. 2258, 
January Term, 2017 
 
11 
138 L.Ed.2d 772 (the right to physician-assisted suicide is not one of those personal 
activities and decisions that th[e] Court has identified as “so deeply rooted in our 
history and traditions, or so fundamental to our concept of constitutionally ordered 
liberty that they are protected by the Fourteenth Amendment”). 
{¶ 19} Importantly, the court has been far more skeptical of creating new 
rights based on substantive due process in criminal-procedure cases.  In Dist. 
Attorney’s Office for Third Judicial Dist. v. Osborne, the court declined to 
recognize a substantive-due-process right to access DNA evidence for testing 
because establishing such a right “would force [the justices] to act as 
policymakers.”  557 U.S. 52, 73-74, 129 S.Ct. 2308, 174 L.Ed.2d 38 (2009).  And 
in Flores, the court declined to recognize a substantive-due-process right asserted 
by undocumented juveniles awaiting deportation proceedings to private placement 
with responsible adults instead of detention in the custody of the Immigration and 
Nationalization Service (INS) because such a right was not “ ‘ “so rooted in the 
traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental.” ’ ”  507 
U.S. at 303, 113 S.Ct. 1439, 123 L.Ed.2d 1, quoting United States v. Salerno, 481 
U.S. 739, 751, 107 S.Ct. 2095, 95 L.Ed.2d 697 (1987), quoting Snyder v. 
Massachusetts, 291 U.S. 97, 105, 54 S.Ct. 330, 78 L.Ed. 674 (1934).  Comparing 
Flores and Osborne to the court’s substantive-due-process jurisprudence in privacy 
cases demonstrates that the court has confined its broad interpretation of substantive 
due process to cases in which government actions prohibited private conduct and 
infringed on personal autonomy. 
{¶ 20} Finally, since Casey, the court has not categorically refused to rely 
exclusively on historical analysis when interpreting Fourteenth Amendment 
protections.  See McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 130 S.Ct. 3020, 177 L.Ed.2d 
894 (2010).  In McDonald, the court determined that the Second Amendment right 
to keep and bear arms applies to the states under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due 
Process Clause.  Id. at 791.  The court reached this conclusion using a Glucksberg 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
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historical analysis, McDonald at 767, concluding that “it is clear that the Framers 
and ratifiers of the Fourteenth Amendment counted the right to keep and bear arms 
among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty,” id. at 
778. 
{¶ 21} The touchstones of the court’s analysis of substantive-due-process 
claims are whether the asserted right is grounded in history and tradition and 
whether the right protects against government intrusion into private conduct, Flores 
at 303; Lawrence, 539 U.S. at 578, 123 S.Ct. 2472, 156 L.Ed.2d 508—not, as 
Justice O’Neill’s dissent suggests, whether the right is a valid “expression of our 
social conscience,” dissenting opinion, O’Neill, J., at ¶ 116. 
2.  Fundamental Fairness    
{¶ 22} Next, we address Aalim’s fundamental-fairness due-process 
argument.  As the United States Supreme Court has observed, “For all its 
consequence, ‘due process’ has never been, and perhaps can never be, precisely 
defined.”  Lassiter v. Durham Cty. Dept. of Social Servs., 452 U.S. 18, 24, 101 S.Ct. 
2153, 68 L.Ed.2d 640 (1981).  Due process is a flexible concept that varies 
depending on the importance attached to the interest at stake and the particular 
circumstances under which the deprivation may occur.  Walters v. Natl. Assn. of 
Radiation Survivors, 473 U.S. 305, 320, 105 S.Ct. 3180, 87 L.Ed.2d 220 (1985).  
“Applying the Due Process Clause is therefore an uncertain enterprise which must 
discover what ‘fundamental fairness’ consists of in a particular situation by first 
considering any relevant precedents and then by assessing the several interests that 
are at stake.”  Lassiter at 24-25.  Accord In re D.S., 146 Ohio St.3d 182, 2016-Ohio-
1027, 54 N.E.3d 1184, ¶ 28 (what process satisfies Article I, Section 16 of the Ohio 
Constitution “depends on considerations of fundamental fairness in a particular 
situation”), citing In re C.S., 115 Ohio St.3d 267, 2007-Ohio-4919, 874 N.E.2d 
1177, ¶ 80, and In re C.P., 131 Ohio St.3d 513, 2012-Ohio-1446, 967 N.E.2d 729, 
¶ 71. 
January Term, 2017 
 
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{¶ 23} Due-process rights are applicable to juveniles through the Due 
Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and 
Article I, Section 16 of the Ohio Constitution.  C.S. at ¶ 79, citing In re Gault, 387 
U.S. 1, 41, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527 (1967); C.P. at ¶ 70.  This court has 
observed that in the context of a juvenile-court proceeding, the term “due process” 
“ ‘expresses the requirement of “fundamental fairness,” a requirement whose 
meaning can be as opaque as its importance is lofty.’ ”  C.S. at ¶ 80, quoting Lassiter 
at 24.  While we have not explicitly articulated what “fundamental fairness” means 
in a juvenile proceeding, “[a] court’s task is to ascertain what process is due in a 
given case, * * * while being true to the core concept of due process in a juvenile 
case—to ensure orderliness and fairness.”  Id. at ¶ 81, citing McKeiver v. 
Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 541, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 (1971) (plurality 
opinion). 
{¶ 24} “The safeguard of a hearing is contained in the Revised Code and 
Rules of Juvenile Procedure, and it is grounded in due process and other 
constitutional protections.”  State v. D.W., 133 Ohio St.3d 434, 2012-Ohio-4544, 
978 N.E.2d 894, ¶ 20.  In United States v. Kent, 383 U.S. 541, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 
L.Ed.2d 84 (1966), the Supreme Court considered what is necessary to satisfy due 
process in the bindover context.  Initially, the court declined to extend all 
constitutional guarantees that would be applicable to adults.  Id. at 556.  
Importantly, however, the court did determine that “constitutional principles 
relating to due process” are applicable to juveniles.  Id. at 557.  For purposes of 
bindover from juvenile court to adult court, the court held that due process is 
satisfied when a juvenile court issues a decision stating its reasons for the transfer 
after conducting a hearing at which the juvenile is represented by counsel.  Id. at 
554. 
{¶ 25} As recently as three years ago, this court recognized: “[T]he 
Supreme Court of the United States has held that the bindover hearing is a ‘critically 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
14 
important proceeding’ and that the hearing ‘must measure up to the essentials of 
due process and fair treatment.’ ”  In re D.M., 140 Ohio St.3d 309, 2014-Ohio-
3628, 18 N.E.3d 404, ¶ 11, quoting Kent at 562.  Moreover, we have quoted Kent 
for the rule that a transfer of a juvenile to adult court should not occur “ ‘without 
ceremony—without hearing, without effective assistance of counsel, without a 
statement of reasons.’ ”  D.W. at ¶ 20, quoting Kent at 554. 
{¶ 26} Relying on the fundamental fairness required by procedural due 
process, the Chief Justice’s dissenting opinion argues that Kent requires that a 
juvenile court judge make an “individualized assessment” based on a “ ‘full 
investigation’ [that] require[s] consideration of the ‘ “entire history of the  
child” ’ ” before transferring a juvenile to adult court.  (Emphasis sic.)  Dissenting 
opinion, O’Connor, C.J., at ¶ 99, quoting Kent at 559, quoting Wakins v. United 
States, 343 F.2d 278, 282 (D.C.Cir.1964).  However, this portion of Kent is 
distinguishable from the facts at issue here.  The General Assembly determines the 
jurisdiction of the juvenile court.  Ohio Constitution, Article IV, Section 4(B).  And 
the General Assembly has determined that in the limited circumstances described 
in R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b), juvenile offenders of a certain age 
charged with aggravated murder, murder, certain serious felonies committed after 
a prior delinquency adjudication, and certain serious felonies committed with a 
firearm shall be bound over to adult court.  In Kent, the United States Supreme 
Court was not declaring that the requirement of the Juvenile Court Act for a “full 
investigation” before transfer was constitutionally required.  Id. at 547.  Instead, the 
court declined to use the Kent decision to broadly apply adult constitutional 
guarantees to children.  Id. at 556.  The court decided Kent based on the unique 
requirements of the applicable statute, the Juvenile Court Act, and it went “no 
further.”  Id.  Moreover, the reliance by the Chief Justice’s dissent on United States 
Supreme Court precedents interpreting juvenile offenders’ Eighth Amendment 
protections is misplaced because those cases were decided based on the Eighth 
January Term, 2017 
 
15 
Amendment, not on the procedural protections found in the Due Process Clause of 
the Fourteenth Amendment.  See dissenting opinion, O’Connor, C.J., at ¶ 58. 
{¶ 27} Here, Aalim’s mandatory bindover from the juvenile division to the 
general division of the common pleas court satisfied the requirements of 
“fundamental fairness” required by Ohio’s Due Course of Law Clause and the 
federal Due Process Clause.  Aalim had a hearing before a juvenile-division judge 
to determine Aalim’s age at the time of the alleged offense and whether there was 
probable cause to believe that he had committed the conduct alleged in the 
complaint.  At this hearing, Aalim was represented by counsel and he had a parent 
present.  After the hearing, the juvenile court issued an entry explaining why it no 
longer had jurisdiction over Aalim.  Only after this proceeding satisfying the 
fundamental fairness required by Ohio’s Due Course of Law Clause and the federal 
Due Process Clause was Aalim transferred from the juvenile division to the general 
division of the common pleas court.  Aalim has failed to show that his bindover 
violated his due-process rights, let alone that the mandatory-bindover statutes 
facially violate the constitutional due-process guarantees. 
B.  Equal Protection 
{¶ 28} Aalim raises two arguments in support of his claim that R.C. 
2152.10(A)(2)(b) and 2152.12(A)(1)(b) violate juveniles’ equal-protection rights.  
First, Aalim contends that juveniles are a suspect class and that therefore, treating 
some juveniles differently triggers strict scrutiny.  Additionally, he argues that the 
age-based distinctions of the mandatory-bindover statutes are not rationally related 
to the purpose of juvenile proceedings. 
{¶ 29} The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the 
United States Constitution provides, “No State shall * * * deny to any person within 
its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”  Ohio’s Equal Protection Clause, 
Article I, Section 2 of the Ohio Constitution, provides, “All political power is 
inherent in the people.  Government is instituted for their equal protection and 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
16 
benefit * * *.”  These two equal-protection provisions are functionally equivalent 
and require the same analysis.  Eppley v. Tri-Valley Local School Dist. Bd. of Edn., 
122 Ohio St.3d 56, 2009-Ohio-1970, 908 N.E.2d 401, ¶ 11. 
{¶ 30} “In considering whether state legislation violates the Equal 
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment * * *, [courts] apply different 
levels of scrutiny to different types of classifications.”  Clark v. Jeter, 486 U.S. 456, 
461, 108 S.Ct. 1910, 100 L.Ed.2d 465 (1988).  We use the same analytic approach 
in determining whether a statutory classification violates Article I, Section 2 of the 
Ohio Constitution.  State v. Williams, 88 Ohio St.3d 513, 530, 728 N.E.2d 342 
(2000). 
{¶ 31} The first step in an equal-protection analysis is to determine the 
proper standard of review.  Arbino v. Johnson & Johnson, 116 Ohio St.3d 468, 
2007-Ohio-6948, 880 N.E.2d 420, ¶ 64.  When legislation infringes upon a 
fundamental constitutional right or the rights of a suspect class, strict scrutiny 
applies.  See Williams at 530.  If neither a fundamental right nor a suspect class is 
involved, the rational-basis test is used.  See, e.g., Menefee v. Queen City Metro, 49 
Ohio St.3d 27, 29, 550 N.E.2d 181 (1990). 
{¶ 32} In order for Aalim’s facial equal-protection challenge to the 
mandatory-bindover statutory scheme to qualify for strict-scrutiny review, Aalim 
must demonstrate that juveniles are a suspect class or that juveniles have a 
fundamental constitutional right to an amenability proceeding.  See Williams at 530. 
{¶ 33} A “suspect class” is defined as “one ‘saddled with such disabilities, 
or subjected to such a history of purposeful unequal treatment, or relegated to such 
a position of political powerlessness as to command extraordinary protection from 
the majoritarian political process.’ ”  Massachusetts Bd. of Retirement v. Murgia, 
427 U.S. 307, 313, 96 S.Ct. 2562, 49 L.Ed.2d 520 (1976), quoting San Antonio 
Indep. School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 28, 93 S.Ct. 1278, 36 L.Ed.2d 16 
(1973).  The United States Supreme Court has noted that “age is not a suspect 
January Term, 2017 
 
17 
classification under the Equal Protection Clause.”  Gregory v. Ashcroft, 501 U.S. 
452, 470, 111 S.Ct. 2395, 115 L.Ed.2d 410 (1991).  Accord State v. Fortson, 11th 
Dist. Portage No. 2011-P-0031, 2012-Ohio-3118, ¶ 41 (“Ohio courts have 
consistently held that juveniles do not constitute a suspect class in the context of 
equal protection law”); In re Vaughn, 12th Dist. Butler No. CA89-11-162, 1990 
WL 116936, *5 (Aug. 13, 1990) (“[J]uveniles have never been treated as a suspect 
class and legislation aimed at juveniles has never been subjected to the test of strict 
scrutiny”).  Under both Ohio and federal law, juveniles are not considered a suspect 
class, and we decline to define them as one now.  And as discussed above with 
respect to substantive due process, juveniles do not have a fundamental right to an 
amenability hearing, because the right to such a hearing is not “deeply rooted in 
this Nation’s history and tradition” and “ ‘implicit in the concept of ordered  
liberty,’ ” Moore, 431 U.S. at 503, 97 S.Ct. 1932, 52 L.Ed.2d 531, quoting Palko, 
302 U.S. at 325, 58 S.Ct. 149, 82 L.Ed. 288. 
{¶ 34} Because the mandatory-bindover statutes do not involve a 
fundamental right or a suspect class, we review the statutes under the rational-basis 
test, which requires us to uphold the statutes if they are rationally related to a 
legitimate governmental purpose, see Arbino, 116 Ohio St.3d 468, 2007-Ohio-
6948, 880 N.E.2d 420, at ¶ 66, citing Williams, 88 Ohio St.3d at 530, 728 N.E.2d 
342.  Under rational-basis review, we grant “substantial deference” to the General 
Assembly’s predictive judgment.  Williams at 531. 
{¶ 35} Under rational-basis review, a decision by the state to treat 
individuals differently is invalidated only when it is “ ‘based solely on reasons 
totally unrelated to the pursuit of the State’s goals and only if no grounds can be 
conceived to justify’ ” it.  Id., quoting Clements v. Fashing, 457 U.S. 957, 963, 102 
S.Ct. 2836, 73 L.Ed.2d 508 (1982), and citing Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 320, 
113 S.Ct. 2637, 125 L.Ed.2d 257 (1993), and Am. Assn. of Univ. Professors, Cent. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
18 
State Univ. Chapter v. Cent. State Univ., 87 Ohio St.3d 55, 58, 717 N.E.2d 286 
(1999). 
{¶ 36} This court has noted that  
 
according to some statistics, between 1965 and 1990, juvenile 
arrests for violent crime quadrupled.  Redding, Juveniles 
Transferred to Criminal Court: Legal Reform Proposals Based on 
Social Science Research (1997), 1997 Utah L.Rev. 709, 762.  As the 
juvenile crime rate began to rise, the public demanded tougher 
treatment of juveniles, and policymakers around the nation rushed 
to legislate a cure.  See, generally, Rossum, Holding Juveniles 
Accountable: Reforming America’s “Juvenile Injustice System 
(1995), 22 Pepperdine L.Rev. 907. 
 
Hanning, 89 Ohio St.3d at 89, 728 N.E.2d 1059.  The General Assembly enacted 
the mandatory-bindover procedure to provide special measures for extraordinary 
cases, involving older or violent offenders.  Id. at 89-90.  We recognized in Hanning 
that former R.C. 2151.26(B)(4)(b), the mandatory-bindover provision applicable to 
16-year-olds who committed a category-two offense with a firearm, was “a narrow 
exception to the usual criteria for determining amenability in certain situations 
where an older child has been accused of an inherently dangerous offense.”  Id. at 
92.  Prosecuting older juveniles who commit serious crimes in the general division 
of a common pleas court is rationally related to the legitimate state interest of 
fighting rising juvenile crime because it allows the most serious juvenile offenders 
to be prosecuted in the general division, where harsher punishments are available.  
This court has recognized that “harms suffered by victims are not dependent upon 
the age of the perpetrator.”  C.S., 115 Ohio St.3d 267, 2007-Ohio-4919, 874 N.E.2d 
1177, at ¶ 74. 
January Term, 2017 
 
19 
{¶ 37} Moreover, there is an explicit mandate in Article IV, Section 4(B) of 
the Ohio Constitution for the General Assembly to define the jurisdiction of all 
divisions of the common pleas courts in this state, and this court is duty bound to 
follow the structure established by the people of Ohio in our state Constitution.  
Therefore, the General Assembly could rationally achieve the legitimate state 
interest of decreased juvenile crime by redefining the jurisdiction of the juvenile 
divisions of the common pleas courts.  The mandatory-bindover statutory scheme 
is rationally related to the legitimate governmental purpose of increased 
punishments for serious juvenile offenders, so it does not violate juveniles’ right to 
equal protection under Article I, Section 2 of the Ohio Constitution. 
III.  CONCLUSION 
{¶ 38} Because this court failed in Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-
8278, __ N.E.3d __, to consider the General Assembly’s exclusive constitutional 
authority to define the jurisdiction of the courts of common pleas under Article IV, 
Section 4(B) of the Ohio Constitution, we grant the state’s motion for 
reconsideration pursuant to S.Ct.Prac.R. 18.02.  Upon reconsideration, we hold that 
the mandatory bindover of certain juvenile offenders under R.C. 2152.10(A)(2)(b) 
and 2152.12(A)(1)(b) complies with due process and equal protection as 
guaranteed by the Ohio and United States Constitutions.  We therefore vacate our 
decision in Aalim I, and we affirm the judgment of the court of appeals upholding 
the trial court’s denial of Aalim’s motion to dismiss his indictment. 
Motion for reconsideration granted 
and judgment affirmed. 
O’DONNELL, FRENCH, and DEWINE, JJ., concur. 
DEWINE, J., concurs, with an opinion joined by O’DONNELL, J. 
FISCHER, J., concurs in part and dissents in part, with an opinion. 
O’CONNOR, C.J., dissents, with an opinion joined by O’NEILL, J. 
O’NEILL, J., dissents, with an opinion. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
20 
_________________ 
DEWINE, J., concurring. 
{¶ 39} I join fully in the court’s decision.  I write separately to emphasize 
why reconsideration is so important in this case.  In my view, State v. Aalim, __ 
Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __ (“Aalim I”), was wrongly decided 
because it contains an error in legal analysis.  But of even greater concern is the 
court’s application of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the 
United States Constitution and the Due Course of Law Clause of the Ohio 
Constitution. 
{¶ 40} The Due Process Clause prohibits a state from depriving “any person 
of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”  Fourteenth Amendment 
to the U.S. Constitution, Section 1.  While the clause on its face would seem to 
concern itself with only the adequacy of procedures employed when one is deprived 
of life, liberty, or property, the United States Supreme Court has read it to include 
a substantive component that forbids some government actions “regardless of the 
fairness of the procedures used to implement them.”  Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 
327, 331, 106 S.Ct. 662, 88 L.Ed.2d 662 (1986).  Unlike procedural due process, 
the substantive component of the Due Process Clause “is suggested neither by its 
language nor by preconstitutional history.”  Moore v. E. Cleveland, 431 U.S. 494, 
543, 97 S.Ct. 1932, 52 L.Ed.2d 531 (1977) (White, J., dissenting). 
{¶ 41} There is a clear demarcation between the two concepts.  While 
procedural due process assesses the adequacy of procedures employed, substantive 
due process reviews legislative enactments.  When the legislature passes a law of 
general application, there is no question about the adequacy of the procedures; the 
legislative process provides all the process that is due.  See 3 Ronald D. Rotunda & 
John E. Nowak, Treatise on Constitutional Law: Substance and Procedure, Section 
17.8(c), at 130 (5th Ed.2012); 75 Acres, L.L.C. v. Miami-Dade Cty., 338 F.3d 1288, 
1294 (11th Cir.2003); Richmond Boro Gun Club, Inc. v. New York, 97 F.3d 681, 
January Term, 2017 
 
21 
689 (2d Cir.1996); Diaz v. Riverside, 895 F.2d 1416 (9th Cir.1990) (unpublished 
table decision), available at 1990 WL 11925, *4; Oklahoma Edn. Assn. v. Alcoholic 
Beverage Laws Enforcement Comm., 889 F.2d 929, 936 (10th Cir.1989); Cty. Line 
Joint Venture v. Grand Prairie, 839 F.2d 1142, 1144 (5th Cir.1988); Brown v. 
Retirement Commt. of Briggs & Stratton Retirement Plan, 797 F.2d 521, 527 (7th 
Cir.1986).  Thus, a challenge to a generalized legislative determination—for 
example, that all juveniles of a certain age who are charged with certain qualifying 
crimes must be tried in adult court—is made under the substantive component of 
the Due Process Clause.  Rotunda & Nowak at 130; 75 Acres at 1294; Richmond 
Boro Gun Club at 689; Cty. Line Joint Venture at 1144; Brown at 527. 
{¶ 42} Somehow, however, our jurisprudence has muddled the two 
concepts. This confusion first became evident in In re C.P., 131 Ohio St.3d 513, 
2012-Ohio-1446, 967 N.E.2d 729.  There, we dealt with a challenge to automatic, 
lifelong registration and notification requirements for juvenile sex offenders tried 
within the juvenile system.  Since the government action at issue was a legislative 
enactment that applied generally to all juveniles convicted of certain charges, the 
only possible due-process challenge was a substantive one.  Yet, rather than analyze 
the challenge under traditional substantive-due-process norms—asking whether the 
restriction was rationally related to a legitimate legislative interest, see, e.g., Toledo 
v. Telling, 114 Ohio St.3d 278, 2007-Ohio-3724, 871 N.E.2d 1152, ¶ 33—the court 
analyzed the enactment under a principle of fundamental fairness. 
{¶ 43} Heretofore, the fundamental-fairness standard had always been a 
procedural standard—one developed by the United States Supreme Court in 
assessing the adequacy of procedures employed in juvenile proceedings.  See 
McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 541-543, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 
(1971) (plurality opinion), citing In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 
527 (1967), and In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970).  
Although the court was not explicit in C.P. about what it was doing—the term 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
22 
substantive due process was never even mentioned—the import of its decision was 
to take the procedural fundamental-fairness standard and transform it into a 
substantive standard. 
{¶ 44} In Aalim I, the court went even further.  The court referred to C.P. 
and its fundamental-fairness standard.  Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, 
__ N.E.3d __, at ¶ 19.  But, perhaps in recognition of the dubious progeny of that 
decision as a matter of federal constitutional jurisprudence, it decided the case 
under the Ohio Constitution.  The court did so by grafting the fundamental-fairness 
standard onto the Ohio Constitution: “[W]e hold that the right to due process under 
the Ohio Constitution requires that all children have the right to an amenability 
hearing before transfer to adult court and that the mandatory-transfer statutes 
violate the right to due process as guaranteed by Article I, Section 16 of the Ohio 
Constitution.”  Id. at ¶ 25.  Quite a feat: in C.P., the court takes a procedural due-
process standard and transforms it into a substantive one; in Aalim I, that 
substantive due-process standard is transplanted into the Ohio Constitution.  
Fortunately, our rules provide us an opportunity to reconsider that decision. 
{¶ 45} It is true, of course, that our state Constitution is a document of 
independent force that may provide greater protection than the United States 
Constitution.  Arnold v. Cleveland, 67 Ohio St.3d 35, 616 N.E.2d 163 (1993), 
paragraph one of the syllabus.  But recognition that our Constitution may provide 
greater protection does not give us unfettered license to strike down legislative 
enactments with which we disagree.  Rather, in construing our state Constitution, 
we are bound by the text of the document as understood in light of our history and 
traditions. 
{¶ 46} Certainly nothing in the language of Article I, Section 16 of our 
Constitution is even remotely implicated by the mandatory-bindover provision:   
 
January Term, 2017 
 
23 
All courts shall be open, and every person, for an injury done him in 
his land, goods, person, or reputation, shall have remedy by due 
course of law, and shall have justice administered without denial or 
delay.  Suits may be brought against the state, in such courts and in 
such manner, as may be provided by law. 
 
And as the majority points out, nothing in our history and traditions suggests that 
the Due Course of Law Clause mandates that juveniles receive an individualized 
determination about where their case is heard.  Majority opinion at ¶ 17.  Just the 
opposite: at the time of the adoption of the Due Course of Law Clause, there were 
no juvenile courts in Ohio.  Id. 
{¶ 47} There is good reason to step back from the addition of this new 
substantive-due-process standard of fundamental fairness to the Ohio Constitution.  
The doctrine of substantive due process has been perhaps the most bedeviling and 
controversial part of our federal constitutional tradition.  Indeed, some of the most 
criticized judicial decisions in American history fall under the rubric of substantive 
due process.  See, e.g., Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393, 15 L.Ed. 691 (1857); 
Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45, 25 S.Ct. 539, 49 L.Ed. 937 (1905).  With fair 
justification, substantive due process has been decried as a “poster child” for 
judicial use of amorphous constitutional doctrine to achieve a court’s own “policy 
goals.”  Johnson v. United States, __ U.S. __, 135 S.Ct. 2551, 2567, 192 L.Ed.2d 
569 (2015) (Thomas, J., concurring).  Because “guideposts for responsible 
decisionmaking in this unchartered area are scarce and open-ended,” courts have 
“always been reluctant to expand the concept of substantive due process.”  Collins 
v. Harker Hts., 503 U.S. 115, 125, 112 S.Ct. 1061, 117 L.Ed.2d 261 (1992). 
{¶ 48} We should be similarly reluctant to read substantive-due-process-
type concepts into the Ohio Constitution.  While it is our duty to independently 
interpret the Ohio Constitution and to enforce its guarantees, we should not treat 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
24 
this responsibility as license to impose policy preferences unconnected with text 
and tradition.  Indeed, the troubled history of federal substantive-due-process 
analysis ought to cause us to pause before incorporating similarly nebulous doctrine 
into our Constitution. 
{¶ 49} Fundamental fairness makes perfect sense as a procedural standard.  
As courts, we are equipped by training and experience to make individualized 
determinations as to whether particular procedures that result in a loss of liberty are 
fundamentally fair.  But to transform fundamental fairness into a substantive 
standard simply invites courts to substitute their policy preferences for those of the 
legislature without any standards to guide such a task. 
{¶ 50} It may well be a good idea to end all mandatory bindovers.  But it is 
not our call to make.  Nothing in our Constitution ordains that we, rather than the 
people’s elected representatives, get to make that decision. 
 
O’DONNELL, J., concurs in the foregoing opinion. 
_________________ 
 
FISCHER, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part. 
{¶ 51} For the reasons stated in my separate opinion in State v. Gonzales, 
___ Ohio St.3d ___, 2017-Ohio-777, ___ N.E.3d ___, ¶ 24, I respectfully vote to 
deny the motion for reconsideration, but I join the majority’s opinion on the merits 
in this case. 
_________________ 
 
O’CONNOR, C.J., dissenting. 
{¶ 52} In declaring our nation’s independence, the founders decreed that the 
inalienable right to liberty was a self-evident truth.  The founders recognized that 
they were asking a substantial sacrifice of colonists: to give up some of that liberty 
to live in a civil society on the mere promise that the government would secure their 
liberty and other important rights.  Advocating for ratification of the Constitution, 
Alexander Hamilton offered reassurance to doubters that their rights would be 
January Term, 2017 
 
25 
protected by checks and balances because “liberty can have nothing to fear from 
the judiciary alone, but would have every thing to fear from its union with either of 
the other departments.”  The Federalist No. 78 at 523 (Cooke Ed.1961). 
{¶ 53} James Madison also supported the separation of powers, writing that 
it “is admitted on all hands to be essential to the preservation of liberty” but warning 
that another particularly applicable consideration in American government would 
be “to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part.”  The 
Federalist No. 51 at 351 (Cooke Ed.1961).  Madison advised: 
 
Justice is the end of government.  It is the end of civil society.  It 
ever has been, and ever will be pursued, until it be obtained, or until 
liberty be lost in the pursuit.  In a society under the forms of which 
the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, 
anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where 
the weaker individual is not secured against the violence of the 
stronger * * * . 
 
Id. at 352. 
{¶ 54} The majority’s decision today brings us one step closer to the 
anarchy about which Madison warned.  The majority blindly affirms the 
constitutionality of the mandatory-transfer statute’s process without even a 
perfunctory analysis of its due-process implications.  The majority’s holding does 
not bring justice for Ohio’s children, who are among our weakest citizens, nor does 
it honor the sacrifices of our founders by “secur[ing] the Blessings of Liberty” to 
future generations, U.S. Constitution, preamble.  Instead, the majority bows to the 
basest instincts of an outspoken faction of our society—fear and anger—to reach a 
result that violates all notions of separation of powers by advancing the interests of 
the executive and legislative branches at the expense of the judiciary.  In its effort 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
26 
to punish appellant, Matthew I. Aalim, the majority shows no respect for the 
judiciary’s role of ensuring that no legislative act contrary to the Constitution be 
allowed to stand.  We all will suffer, at least in the short term, as a result of today’s 
decision. 
{¶ 55} Fortunately, however, the United States Supreme Court has not been 
so quick to dispense with its own role or the principles upon which our country was 
founded.  The high court recognizes that “[d]ue process of law is the primary and 
indispensable foundation of individual freedom.  It is the basic and essential term 
in the social compact which defines the rights of the individual and delimits the 
powers which the state may exercise.”  In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 20, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 
18 L.Ed.2d 527 (1967). 
{¶ 56} The right to due process of law is not limited to adults facing a 
deprivation of liberty.  Id. at 13.  Rather, it is an essential and eternal promise of 
the Constitution to all Americans, including our youth.  Although a child is too 
young to vote for their legislators and, in Ohio, their judges, those legislators and 
judges cannot ignore the constitutional protections safeguarding a child’s liberty.  
And even though good motives may have informed the development of the juvenile 
court systems throughout the United States, the Supreme Court has reminded us 
that “[t]he absence of procedural rules based upon constitutional principle has not 
always produced fair, efficient, and effective procedures.  Departures from 
established principles of due process have frequently resulted not in enlightened 
procedure, but in arbitrariness.”  Id. at 18-19. 
{¶ 57} After today, in Ohio, an alleged juvenile offender will once again be 
subject to mandatory transfer out of juvenile court to face an adult criminal 
conviction on a mere showing of probable cause to believe that the child committed 
the offense charged, regardless of whether the child is amenable to rehabilitation 
and treatment in the juvenile-justice system.  To deprive a child of his or her liberty 
January Term, 2017 
 
27 
with such limited procedure falls short of the “procedural regularity and exercise of 
care implied in the phrase ‘due process.’ ”  Id. at 27-28. 
{¶ 58} A majority of the court, under the guise of judicial restraint, reverses 
on a motion for reconsideration of our decision in State v. Aalim, __ Ohio St.3d __, 
2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __ (“Aalim I”).2  But make no mistake: the court’s 
decision approves the arbitrary deprivation of access to the juvenile system and 
what should be the sine qua non of juvenile-transfer hearings—the determination 
whether the juvenile is amenable to rehabilitation.  The majority does so by 
affording blind deference to the legislature, ignoring the requirements of due 
process and fairness, and artificially constraining the United States Supreme 
Court’s commands that we must consider juvenile offenders differently than adult 
offenders, see Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460, 470, 132 S.Ct. 2455, 183 L.Ed.2d 
407 (2012) (holding that sentences imposing mandatory life imprisonment without 
the possibility of parole on individuals who committed their crimes when under the 
age of 18 violates the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution); J.D.B. 
v. North Carolina, 564 U.S. 261, 265, 131 S.Ct. 2394, 180 L.Ed.2d 310 (2011) 
(holding that police must consider the age of a juvenile suspect when determining 
whether the juvenile is in custody for purposes of Miranda warnings, see Miranda 
v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966)); Roper v. 
                                                 
2 The state contends, and the majority agrees, that reconsideration of Aalim I is warranted because 
this court failed to consider Article IV, Section 4(B) of the Ohio Constitution, which generally 
confers authority to the General Assembly to define the jurisdiction of the courts of common pleas.  
The state raised that rationale during oral argument on the merits of this case.  Aalim I clearly 
acknowledged that juvenile courts are a legislative creation and that the General Assembly has made 
substantive changes to the Juvenile Code.  Aalim I at ¶ 16.  And a concurring and dissenting opinion 
stated, “[T]he General Assembly created Ohio’s juvenile courts in R.C. Chapter 2151, and 
consequently, juvenile courts are creatures of statute.  As a statutorily created court, the juvenile 
court has limited jurisdiction, and it can exercise only the authority conferred upon it by the General 
Assembly.”  (Citation omitted.)  Aalim I at ¶ 39 (Kennedy, J., concurring and dissenting).  Thus, the 
state’s motion for reconsideration relies on no new fact or legal argument that we failed to consider 
in Aalim I.  See S.Ct.Prac.R. 18.02(B) (“A motion for reconsideration shall not constitute a 
reargument of the case * * *”).  Reconsideration is therefore unwarranted here. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
28 
Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 570-571, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005) (holding 
that the execution of individuals who were under 18 years of age at the time they 
committed capital crimes violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the 
United States Constitution). 
{¶ 59} The concurring justice’s eagerness to reconsider Aalim I appears to 
be based on a reluctance to recognize federal substantive-due-process jurisprudence 
or to incorporate substantive-due-process protections into the Ohio Constitution.  
This signals a departure from settled law and the maxim that the federal 
Constitution provides the floor, not the ceiling, for constitutional rights. 
{¶ 60} Aalim, an African-American youth who was 16 years old and, 
according to his counsel, had no criminal record at the time of his transfer hearing, 
was nevertheless treated as an adult and haled into the Montgomery County Court 
of Common Pleas to face a maximum sentence of over 20 years of imprisonment 
and $40,000 in sanctions (exclusive of court costs and restitution) on two first-
degree-felony counts of aggravated robbery with firearm specifications.3  Given the 
importance of the constitutional issue before us, and the Supreme Court’s silence 
on the constitutionality of juvenile-transfer statutes since its decision more than 50 
years ago in United States v. Kent, 383 U.S. 541, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84 
(1966), today’s majority opinion warrants discretionary review by the United States 
Supreme Court. 
{¶ 61} The constitutional vacuum that will now exist in Ohio for juveniles 
subject to mandatory-transfer hearings cannot be reconciled with the United States 
                                                 
3 After his motion to dismiss on constitutional grounds was denied, Aalim pleaded no contest as part 
of a plea bargain in which the state dismissed the firearm specifications.  He was sentenced to four 
years of imprisonment on each count, to run concurrently, in addition to five years of postrelease 
control and restitution of $531.97, ostensibly for the cell phone that he was convicted of stealing. 
 
January Term, 2017 
 
29 
Supreme Court’s recent teachings regarding juveniles, nor can it fulfill the Supreme 
Court’s declaration with respect to transfer hearings that “ ‘there is no place in our 
system of law for reaching a result of such tremendous consequences without 
ceremony.’ ”  Gault, 387 U.S. at 30, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527, quoting Kent 
at 554. 
{¶ 62} Unable to give countenance to the analysis offered by the majority 
to achieve its desired result, I dissent. 
BACKGROUND 
{¶ 63} As the majority notes, the General Assembly established the first 
juvenile court in Ohio in Cuyahoga County in 1902 and subsequently expanded the 
system statewide.  In re Agler, 19 Ohio St.2d 70, 73, 249 N.E.2d 808 (1969).  From 
their inception, the juvenile courts have dealt with children charged with violating 
criminal statutes.  Whitlatch, The Juvenile Court—A Court of Law, 18 Case 
W.Res.U.L.Rev. 1239, 1241 (1967).  In 1937, the General Assembly vested the 
juvenile courts statewide with “exclusive original jurisdiction * * * [c]oncerning 
any child who is * * * delinquent.”  Am.S.B. 268, 117 Ohio Laws 520, 524 
(currently codified at R.C. 2151.23(A)(1)).  Accordingly, in Ohio, since 1937, 
children charged with violations of criminal laws have had a statutory entitlement 
to be dealt with by juvenile court judges who have “expertise” due to their 
familiarity with the juvenile-justice system and its rehabilitative goals, State v. 
D.H., 120 Ohio St.3d 540, 2009-Ohio-9, 901 N.E.2d 209, ¶ 59. 
{¶ 64} As we have previously explained, juvenile courts were established 
with certain objectives that made them distinct from adult courts, despite their 
similar roles in adjudicating individuals accused of violating criminal statutes: 
 
The juvenile courts were premised on profoundly different 
assumptions and goals than a criminal court, United States v. 
Johnson (C.A.D.C.1994), 28 F.3d 151, 157 (Wald, J., dissenting), 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
30 
and eschewed traditional, objective criminal standards and 
retributive notions of justice.  Instead, a new civil adjudication 
scheme arose, with a focus on the state’s role as parens patriae and 
the vision that the courts would protect the wayward child from 
“evil influences,” “save” him from criminal prosecution, and 
provide him social and rehabilitative services.  In re T.R. (1990), 
52 Ohio St.3d 6, 15, 556 N.E.2d 439; Children’s Home of Marion 
Cty. v. Fetter (1914), 90 Ohio St. 110, 127, 106 N.E. 761; Ex parte 
Januszewski (C.C.Ohio 1911), 196 F. 123, 127. 
 
In re C.S., 115 Ohio St.3d 267, 2007-Ohio-4919, 874 N.E.2d 1177, ¶ 66. 
{¶ 65} Despite these different goals between juvenile and adult courts, the 
establishment of juvenile courts was not a license for the General Assembly to 
deprive juveniles of their constitutional rights.  In fact, juveniles are entitled to a 
range of rights grounded in constitutional protections.  See Kent, 383 U.S. at 562, 
86 S.Ct. 1045, 16, L.Ed.2d 84; In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 367-368, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 
25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970) (applying reasonable-doubt standard to juvenile offenders); 
Gault, 387 U.S. at 41, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527 (recognizing juveniles’ right 
to counsel in certain juvenile proceedings); State v. Walls, 96 Ohio St.3d 437, 2002-
Ohio-5059, 775 N.E.2d 829, ¶ 26 (“numerous constitutional safeguards normally 
reserved for criminal prosecutions are equally applicable to juvenile delinquency 
proceedings”). 
{¶ 66} When a state legislature attempts to restrict the constitutional 
protections owed juveniles, the United States Supreme Court restores them.  See 
Bellotti v. Baird, 443 U.S. 622, 648, 99 S.Ct. 3035, 61 L.Ed.2d 797 (1979) (lead 
opinion) (a state cannot unduly burden a minor’s right to an abortion); Ingraham v. 
Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 674, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977) (corporal 
punishment implicates a child’s liberty interest); Breed v. Jones, 421 U.S. 519, 532-
January Term, 2017 
 
31 
533, 95 S.Ct. 1779, 44 L.Ed.2d 346 (1975) (double-jeopardy protections apply to 
juveniles).  Thus, the court remains an important check on the legislature ensuring 
the rights of children in juvenile proceedings, just as it is on guard for legislative 
overreach in other areas of the law. 
{¶ 67} We are required to apply the same constitutional check to the 
mandatory-transfer procedure established in Ohio, considering whether it comports 
with the requirements of due process and fairness. 
{¶ 68} The General Assembly established mandatory transfer in 1986 
during a wave of pro-punishment legislation.4  As this case exemplifies, mandatory-
transfer hearings are relatively recent in the scheme of juvenile justice in Ohio and 
the United States.  And because a transfer to adult court almost always is intended 
to allow for a harsher sentence than a juvenile court could impose, mandatory 
transfer implicates the punitive aspect of sentencing and deprives the juvenile of 
access to the rehabilitative hallmarks of the juvenile-justice system. 
{¶ 69} That result is not surprising given that mandatory-transfer hearings 
were borne of state legislators who, after Kent and Gault, had become more 
sanguine about criminal punishment of young offenders in response to perceived—
or misperceived—increases in juvenile crime, see, e.g., Waterfall, Note, State v. 
Muniz: Authorizing Adult Sentencing of Juveniles Absent a Conviction that 
Authorizes an Adult Sentence, 35 N.M.L.Rev. 229, 231 (2005).  Juvenile-justice 
policy shifted from a parens patriae mission toward schemes in which punishment 
played an increasingly prominent role, particularly for juvenile offenders charged 
with firearm offenses, homicides, and other indicia of gang-related activity.  
Bishop, Juvenile Offenders in the Adult Criminal Justice System, 27 Crime & Just. 
81, 83-84 (2000). 
                                                 
4   In 1986, the General Assembly enacted the first mandatory-transfer statute in Ohio, the precursor 
of the mandatory-transfer statute currently codified in R.C. Chapter 2152.  Sub.H.B. No. 499, 141 
Ohio Laws, Part II, 4633 (effective Mar. 11, 1987). 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
32 
{¶ 70} Rather than seeing the juvenile-justice system’s role as ameliorative 
and rehabilitative, the new legislative approaches were “ ‘designed to crack down 
on juvenile crime,’ and generally involved ‘expanded eligibility for criminal court 
processing and adult correctional sanctioning’ ” of juveniles.  Waterfall at 231, 
quoting Bilchik, U.S. Dept. of Justice, The Juvenile Justice System Was Founded 
on the Concept of Rehabilitation through Individualized Justice, 1999 National 
Report 
Series: 
Juvenile 
Justice 
Bulletin, 
at 
https://www.ncjrs.gov/html/ojjdp/9912_2/contents.html.  See also State v. 
Hanning, 89 Ohio St.3d 86, 89, 728 N.E.2d 105 (2000) (the mandatory-transfer 
statute is “part of Ohio’s response to rising juvenile crime”).  Rather than seeing 
juveniles as misguided and immature but worthy of redemption, the new legislation 
saw them as vicious and savvy, and “as adult-like, incipient career criminals,” 
Bishop at 84. 
{¶ 71} State legislators were keenly aware of the ramifications of a 
juvenile’s transfer from juvenile court and its therapeutic milieu to adult court, in 
which punishment and deterrence are integral.  In fact, transfer hearings were at the 
core of the “get tough” legislative response to the perceived epidemic of juvenile 
violence in this country, including here in Ohio.  Hanning at 89; Redding, Juveniles 
Transferred to Criminal Court: Legal Reform Proposals Based on Social Science 
Research, 1997 Utah L.Rev. 709, 710-715 (1997). 
{¶ 72} This “transformation of transfer policy has been quick and 
dramatic.”  Bishop, 27 Crime & Just. at 84.  Between 1992 and 1997, at least 44 
states and the District of Columbia enacted provisions to expediently facilitate the 
transfer of young offenders to adult court by establishing “offense-based, 
categorical, and absolute alternatives to individualized, offender-oriented waiver 
proceedings in the juvenile court” that streamlined the transfer process.  Id.  “As a 
result, in many states transfer implicates a broad range of offenders who are neither 
January Term, 2017 
 
33 
particularly serious nor particularly chronic, some of whom are not yet in their 
teens.”  Id. at 84-85. 
{¶ 73} In Ohio, the mandatory-transfer provision was one of the hallmarks 
of the state’s “get-tough approach” to crimes committed by juveniles, creating a 
transfer provision wholly different from the discretionary transfers that previously 
were the sine qua non of juvenile transfers.5  Hanning, 89 Ohio St.3d at 89, 728 
N.E.2d 105.  In this new regime, it is not the child’s status as a juvenile that governs 
sentencing but, rather, the forum in which the child offender is adjudicated, so that 
the sentence ultimately imposed is one that is harsher than what a juvenile court 
would impose.  The transfer hearing implicates far more significant issues than the 
venue or forum of trial; it serves as a vehicle by which a child offender is deprived 
of the rehabilitation and treatment potential of the juvenile-justice system. 
{¶ 74} Indeed, apparently that is the point.  The state asserted at oral 
argument that the transfer of the juvenile to the adult system is about punishment, 
not procedure:  “But the crux of the issue is punishment.  That’s what this is all 
about.  It’s not really about process, it’s not about procedure.  It’s about what do 
we do to punish these juveniles who are transferred over to adult court.”  (Emphasis 
added.)  And because the issue implicates punishment, the Supreme Court’s 
teachings in J.D.B., Miller, and Roper regarding constitutional limitations on 
juvenile sentencing are implicated as strongly as its holding in Kent, 383 U.S. at 
560, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84, which recognized that transfer hearings are 
“critically important” for juveniles. 
 
 
                                                 
5 In a discretionary transfer, the juvenile court judge has the discretion to relinquish the juvenile 
court’s jurisdiction over a youth and transfer or “bind over” the juvenile to adult court if the judge 
determines that the individual is not amenable to care or rehabilitation within the juvenile-justice 
system and appears to be a threat to public safety.  See R.C. 2151.26(B)(3).  The rubric of a 
mandatory transfer is quite different. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
34 
ANALYSIS 
{¶ 75} The majority’s holding today fundamentally misunderstands and 
minimizes the role of due process in juvenile cases.  Although Ohio’s mandatory-
transfer statute provides some process before depriving a child offender of access 
to the juvenile-justice system, that process is inadequate under the applicable 
balancing test established by the United States Supreme Court.  Additionally, 
mandatory transfer does not comport with the concept of fundamental fairness, 
which we must apply to juveniles at risk of being deprived of a liberty interest.  
Given the paucity of precedent concerning juvenile-transfer statutes, this case will 
offer the United States Supreme Court the opportunity to provide further guidance 
in this area. 
Even under a Procedural Due-Process Analysis, the Majority Fails to Establish 
that the Limited Procedure of the Mandatory-Transfer Hearing Satisfies 
Constitutional Protections 
{¶ 76} The Supreme Court recognizes that by enacting legislation, states 
may create liberty interests that are protected by the federal Due Process Clause.  
See, e.g., Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 483-484, 115 S.Ct. 2293, 132 L.Ed.2d 
418 (1995), citing Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 
935 (1974).  “Whether any procedural protections are due depends on the extent to 
which an individual will be ‘condemned to suffer grievous loss.’ ”  Morrissey v. 
Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 481, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484 (1972), quoting Joint 
Anti-Fascist Refugee Commt. v. McGrath, 341 U.S. 123, 168, 71 S.Ct. 624, 95 
L.Ed. 817 (1951) (Frankfurter, J., concurring).  “The question is not merely the 
‘weight’ of the individual’s interest, but whether the nature of the interest is one 
within the contemplation of the ‘liberty or property’ language of the Fourteenth 
Amendment.”  Id., citing Fuentes v. Shevin, 407 U.S. 67, 92 S.Ct. 1983, 32 L.Ed.2d 
556 (1972).  “Once it is determined that due process applies, the question remains 
what process is due.”  Id. 
January Term, 2017 
 
35 
{¶ 77} The majority wholly fails to consider the balancing test applicable 
for determining what process is due to a juvenile at a mandatory-transfer hearing, 
in all likelihood because there is no way to do so without reaching the conclusion 
that the process that Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute affords is not enough.6   
{¶ 78} Even if the majority were correct that the right to retaining juvenile 
status is not fundamental, once a state provides statutory rights greater than those 
afforded by the federal Constitution, the Constitution prohibits the state from 
divesting citizens of those rights without due process.  See Connecticut Bd. of 
Pardons v. Dumschat, 452 U.S. 458, 463, 101 S.Ct. 2460, 69 L.Ed.2d 158 (1981) 
(“A state-created right can, in some circumstances, beget yet other rights to 
procedures essential to the realization of the parent right”).  See also Sandin at 483-
484, citing Wolff (“we recognize that States may under certain circumstances create 
liberty interests which are protected by the Due Process Clause”). 
                                                 
6  The concurring opinion’s attack on substantive due process is also misplaced because the court’s 
decision in Aalim I was premised on the tenets of procedural due process, see Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d 
__, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __, ¶ 25 (“juvenile procedures themselves also must account for the 
differences in children versus adults”).  And in any event, the concurrence is unpersuasive on its 
merits.  The United States Supreme Court has limited the substantive-due-process doctrine but has 
not abandoned it.  See, e.g., Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 573-574, 123 S.Ct. 2472, 156 L.Ed.2d 
508 (2003), citing Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 851, 
112 S.Ct. 2791, 120 L.Ed.2d 674 (1992).  Although Justice Thomas recently declared in a dissenting 
opinion that “the Due Process Clause confers no substantive rights,” Nelson v. Colorado, __ U.S. 
__, 137 S.Ct. 1249, 1265, __ L.Ed.2d __ (2017) (Thomas, J., dissenting), his opinion was not joined 
by any other justice.  Similarly unpersuasive are the concurrence’s citations to a dissenting opinion 
and a concurring opinion to support its position as to what federal constitutional law should be.  
Concurring opinion at ¶ 40, 47. 
The concurring opinion’s characterization of the procedural-due-process standard is also 
flawed.  The opinion declares, with citation to a treatise and federal Court of Appeals decisions that 
cite the same, “When the legislature passes a law of general application, there is no question about 
the adequacy of the procedures; the legislative process provides all the process that is due.”  Id. at  
¶ 41.  This statement is remarkably overbroad and offered without any context.  In the Supreme 
Court’s most recent due-process decision, the court struck down a state statute as unconstitutional 
because it created too many procedural hurdles for an individual to vindicate his or her right to 
regain money paid to the state as the result of a conviction that has been overturned.  Nelson at __, 
137 S.Ct. at 1257-1258.  The court applied “[t]he familiar procedural due process inspection 
instructed by Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 (1976),” Nelson at 
__, 137 S.Ct. at 1255, as we should here. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
36 
{¶ 79} Here, there should be no debate that an alleged juvenile offender has 
a substantial liberty interest in retaining juvenile status.  Since 1937, in Ohio, any 
child under age 18 who is alleged to have committed a crime has been subject in 
the first instance to the juvenile court and its attendant procedures.  The General 
Assembly first created a discretionary-transfer scheme, then later created a 
mandatory-transfer scheme as the procedural mechanisms by which to deprive a 
child of his or her juvenile status and, as a result, access to the juvenile-justice 
system. 
{¶ 80} Unlike some states with mandatory-transfer laws under which the 
child loses his or her juvenile status at the moment of the filing of a charge alleging 
a crime covered by the mandatory-transfer statute,7 Ohio’s General Assembly 
provided some process to the child, requiring the juvenile court to find age 
eligibility and probable cause to believe that the child committed a crime covered 
by the mandatory-transfer statute before revoking juvenile status.  Because this very 
limited process is insufficient to vindicate the child’s significant liberty interest in 
retaining juvenile status, I would conclude that it is unconstitutional. 
{¶ 81} Because the requirements of due process are “flexible and call[] for 
such procedural protections as the particular situation demands,” Morrissey, 408 
U.S. at 481, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484, courts must apply the framework 
established in Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 
(1976), before validating actions adverse to an individual’s liberty interest.8 
Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209, 224, 125 S.Ct. 2384, 162 L.Ed.2d 174 (2005). 
                                                 
7   See, e.g., Conn.Gen.Stat.Ann. 46b-127(a) (a child immediately loses juvenile status upon being 
charged with certain crimes if the child was at least 15 years old at the time of the alleged offense); 
D.C.Code 16-2301 (the definition of “child” in juvenile court jurisdictional statute excludes 
individuals aged 16 or older who are charged with certain crimes); N.Y.Penal Law 30.00 (13- to 15-
year-olds are criminally responsible for certain offenses and not subject to the jurisdiction of the 
juvenile court). 
8 In Patterson v. New York, 432 U.S. 197, 97 S.Ct. 2319, 53 L.Ed.2d 281 (1977), the Supreme Court 
set forth a narrower procedural-due-process inquiry than the Mathews framework for application in 
matters of criminal procedure: whether a state rule “ ‘ offends some principle of justice so rooted in 
January Term, 2017 
 
37 
{¶ 82} Mathews requires consideration of three distinct factors: 
 
[f]irst, the private interest that will be affected by the official action; 
second, the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through 
the procedures used, and the probable value, if any, of additional or 
substitute procedural safeguards; and finally, the Government’s 
interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and 
administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural 
requirement would entail. 
 
Mathews at 335. 
{¶ 83} In considering the first factor, there should be no debate that a child’s 
liberty interest in retaining juvenile status is substantial.  “The possibility of transfer 
from juvenile court to a court of general criminal jurisdiction is a matter of great 
significance to the juvenile.”  Breed, 421 U.S. at 535, 95 S.Ct. 1779, 44 L.Ed.2d 
346.  The child’s liberty interests clearly are in jeopardy if the child is treated as an 
adult, subject to adult penalties, in criminal courts.  Not only do many child 
offenders receive harsher sentences in adult court, but all child offenders with adult 
convictions face the collateral consequences of those convictions—including 
                                                 
the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental.’ ”  Id. at 202, quoting 
Snyder v. Massachusetts, 291 U.S. 97, 105, 54 S.Ct. 330, 78 L.Ed. 674 (1934).  But the Supreme 
Court has made clear that this narrower standard applies to state procedural rules that are part of the 
criminal process.  Medina v. California, 505 U.S. 437, 443, 445, 112 S.Ct. 2572, 120 L.Ed.2d 353 
(1992).  Thus, it is irrelevant here because we have previously established that “[j]uvenile 
delinquency proceedings are civil rather than criminal in character,” In re A.J.S., 120 Ohio St.3d 
185, 2008-Ohio-5307, 897 N.E.2d 629, ¶ 26; see also In re A.G., 148 Ohio St.3d 118, 2016-Ohio-
3306, 69 N.E.3d 646, ¶ 26 (O’Donnell, J., dissenting, joined by French and Kennedy, JJ.) (“ ‘a 
juvenile court proceeding is a civil action’ ”), quoting State v. Adkins, 129 Ohio St.3d 287, 2011-
Ohio-3141, 951 N.E.2d 766, ¶ 10.  Notably, I am aware of no juvenile case in which the United 
States Supreme Court applied the Patterson standard to a due-process challenge. 
     
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
38 
public awareness of their crimes—in a manner far greater than they would in 
juvenile court. 
{¶ 84} Notably, the law requires juvenile courts to seal records pertaining 
to juveniles who were arrested; juveniles whose cases were resolved without the 
filing of a complaint or by dismissal on the merits; juveniles who have successfully 
completed a pretrial diversion program; and juveniles who were adjudicated as 
unruly children, have turned 18 years old, and are not under the jurisdiction of the 
juvenile court.  R.C. 2151.356(B).  Other records may be sealed six months after 
adjudication or after the unconditional discharge of the individual from the 
Department of Youth Services.  R.C. 2151.356(C)(1)(a).  There is no such 
requirement in adult court, in which the offender’s youthful mistakes are likely to 
stay in the public record forever. 
{¶ 85} Indeed, this court has noted that the “collateral legal consequences 
associated with a felony conviction are severe and obvious.”  State v. Golston, 71 
Ohio St.3d 224, 227, 643 N.E.2d 109 (1994).  Perhaps most severe is “the infamy 
and disgrace resulting from a felony conviction [that] seriously affects a person’s 
reputation and economic and social opportunities in our society.”  Id.  But an adult 
criminal conviction also raises more tangible penalties.  Convicted felons may not 
serve on juries or hold an office of “honor, trust, or profit.”  R.C. 2961.01(A)(1).  
Depending on the crime, an individual with a conviction may be statutorily 
precluded from engaging in many occupations and professions.  See, e.g., R.C. 
1321.37(B)(4) (commercial transactions); R.C. 3772.10(C)(1) (casino employee); 
R.C. 4709.13(B)(1) (barber); R.C. 4738.07(A)(4) (motor-vehicle-salvage work).  
Individuals convicted of violating certain drug laws, R.C. 4510.17, or firearm laws, 
R.C. 2923.122(F)(1), are subject to driver’s-license suspension. 
{¶ 86} Moreover, research suggests that juveniles face far greater risks of 
violent attacks and suicide after being sentenced to imprisonment in adult facilities.  
Kimbrell, It Takes A Village to Waive A Child . . . or at Least A Jury: Applying 
January Term, 2017 
 
39 
Apprendi to Juvenile Waiver Hearings in Oregon, 52 Willamette L.Rev. 61, 65 
(2015).  “[J]uveniles in adult facilities are five times more likely than adult 
offenders, and eight times more likely than juvenile offenders in juvenile facilities, 
to commit suicide.”  Id. at 66. 
{¶ 87} And importantly, juveniles who are transferred to adult court for a 
criminal trial are more likely to be incarcerated, more likely to receive longer 
periods of incarceration, and have significantly higher rates of recidivism and 
reoffend more quickly.  Bishop et al., The Transfer of Juveniles to Criminal Court: 
Does It Make a Difference?, 42(2) Crime and Delinquency 171, 183 (1996).  No 
wonder that over the past decade, many states have enacted laws that once again 
channel young offenders to juvenile courts.  See Crime and the Adolescent Brain, 
N.Y. Times (Mar. 12, 2017).  Thus, a child’s liberty interest in retaining his or her 
status as a juvenile subject to the juvenile-justice system is significant. 
{¶ 88} The second Mathews factor is the risk of an erroneous deprivation 
through the process offered.  Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute permits the judge 
to consider just two factors before transferring to adult court a juvenile accused of 
committing a crime covered by the law: the juvenile’s age at the time of the charged 
offense and whether there is probable cause to believe that the juvenile committed 
the mandatory-transfer-eligible conduct.  R.C. 2152.12(A).  The statute does not 
permit the judge to consider any mitigating evidence, such as whether the accused 
lacks criminal history, has a mental illness, is emotionally or psychologically 
immature, or was under duress at the time of the alleged crime.  All of these factors 
may be considered only at a discretionary-transfer hearing.  R.C. 2152.12(E).  Most 
importantly, there may be no consideration of whether the accused is amenable to 
rehabilitation, the hallmark purpose of the juvenile-justice system. 
{¶ 89} As the United States Supreme Court recognized in Miller, “none of 
what [Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 130 S.Ct. 2011, 176 L.Ed.2d 825 (2010)] 
said about children—about their distinctive (and transitory) mental traits and 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
40 
environmental vulnerabilities—is crime-specific.”  Miller, 567 U.S. at 473, 132 
S.Ct. 2455, 183 L.Ed.2d 407.  And the court has recognized that “it is less 
supportable to conclude that even a heinous crime committed by a juvenile is 
evidence of irretrievably depraved character.  From a moral standpoint it would be 
misguided to equate the failings of a minor with those of an adult, for a greater 
possibility exists that a minor’s character deficiencies will be reformed.”  Roper, 
543 U.S. at 570, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1.  Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute 
creates a system in which a judge has no right to even inquire into a juvenile’s 
potential for rehabilitation, let alone weigh it.  Without allowing a judge to conduct 
any inquiry beyond probable cause or age, there is significant risk of turning a 
delinquent capable of rehabilitation into a lifelong criminal.  Thus, the risk of 
erroneous deprivation of the child’s status as a juvenile offender is substantial. 
{¶ 90} The third and final Mathews factor is the government’s interest, 
including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the 
additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail.  “The extent to which 
procedural due process must be afforded the recipient is influenced by the extent to 
which he may be ‘condemned to suffer grievous loss,’ and depends upon whether 
the recipient’s interest in avoiding that loss outweighs the governmental interest in 
summary adjudication.”  Morrissey, 408 U.S. at 481, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 
484, quoting Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Commt., 341 U.S. at 168, 71 S.Ct. 624, 95 
L.Ed. 817 (Frankfurter, J., concurring).  Mathews recognizes that “[a]t some point 
the benefit of an additional safeguard to the individual affected * * * and to society 
in terms of increased assurance that the action is just, may be outweighed by the 
cost.”  424 U.S. at 348, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18. 
{¶ 91} But a discretionary-transfer system is not a burden to the state or the 
bench.  With respect to the time and resources required, the difference between an 
amenability hearing in discretionary-transfer proceedings and the token hearing 
conducted prior to a mandatory transfer is minimal in the overall scheme.  At a 
January Term, 2017 
 
41 
discretionary-transfer hearing, the judge must determine the age of the accused and 
whether there is probable cause to believe that he or she committed the charged 
crime, just as a judge must do at a mandatory-transfer hearing.  See R.C. 2152.12(A) 
and (B).  There are only two other, albeit significant, requirements at a 
discretionary-transfer hearing: the judge must determine whether the juvenile is 
“amenable to care or rehabilitation within the juvenile system, and [whether] the 
safety of the community * * * requires an adult sanction for the juvenile.”  R.C. 
2152.12(B)(3).  To assist in making these determinations, the judge must order an 
investigation “into the child’s social history, education, family situation, and any 
other factor bearing on whether the child is amenable to juvenile rehabilitation, 
including a mental examination of the child by a public or private agency or a 
person qualified to make the examination.”  R.C. 2152.12(C). 
{¶ 92} The relevant question when considering the third Mathews factor is 
not whether the process will burden the state at all but, rather, whether the burden 
of additional procedural safeguards outweighs the child’s liberty interest in 
retaining juvenile status and the risk of erroneously depriving the child of that 
status. 
{¶ 93} The child’s interest in retaining his or her juvenile status and the 
significant risk that children capable of rehabilitation will be prosecuted in adult 
court as a result of the bare-bones procedure set forth in the mandatory-transfer 
statute clearly outweigh the state’s limited burden of conducting the investigation 
required by R.C. 2152.12(C) prior to the transfer hearing.  Accordingly, I would 
conclude that the limited “process” afforded under the mandatory-transfer statute 
is fundamentally inadequate and therefore unconstitutional. 
 
 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
42 
Fundamental Fairness in Juvenile Proceedings Requires Consideration of a 
Juvenile’s Amenability to Rehabilitation and Treatment in the Juvenile-Justice 
System 
{¶ 94} “[T]he applicable due process standard in juvenile proceedings, as 
developed by Gault [387 U.S. 1, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 L.Ed.2d 527] and Winship [397 
U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368] is fundamental fairness.”  McKeiver v. 
Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 543, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 (1971) (plurality 
opinion).  As we have recognized, the meaning of fundamental fairness “ ‘can be 
as opaque as its importance is lofty.’ ”  C.S., 115 Ohio St.3d 267, 2007-Ohio-4919, 
874 N.E.2d 1177, at ¶ 80, quoting Lassiter v. Durham Cty. Dept. of Social Servs., 
452 U.S. 18, 24, 101 S.Ct. 2153, 68 L.Ed.2d 640 (1981).  In Kent, the United States 
Supreme Court emphasized that a juvenile-transfer hearing is a “critically 
important” proceeding and “must measure up to the essentials of due process and 
fair treatment.”  383 U.S. at 560, 562, 68 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84; accord Gault 
at 12, citing Kent at 553. 
{¶ 95} The majority concludes that Aalim’s mandatory-transfer hearing 
satisfied the fundamental-fairness standards set forth in Kent because Aalim had a 
hearing at which his attorney and his mother were present and was given a written 
decision on transfer.  Majority opinion at ¶ 27.  The majority opinion thereby 
reduces the analysis to consideration of only two facts: the youth’s age as a number 
only and whether there is probable cause to believe that the youth committed the 
charged crime.  Kent did not contemplate that result and did not endorse it as a 
matter of due process or fairness.  Quite the contrary. 
{¶ 96} In Kent, the juvenile appellant was subject not to mandatory transfer 
but to a juvenile court judge’s decision to waive the jurisdiction of the juvenile 
court.  But the effect of these two procedures is the same.  Kent, like Aalim, was 
subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the juvenile court when he was charged at 
age 16.  Kent was also subject to a waiver of the juvenile court’s jurisdiction under 
January Term, 2017 
 
43 
the District of Columbia’s Juvenile Court Act.  Under this statutory scheme, the 
juvenile court judge could, after conducting a “full investigation,” waive the 
juvenile court’s jurisdiction and transfer the case to the district (i.e., adult) court for 
adjudication of an offender at least 16 years old and charged with an offense that, 
if committed by an adult, would be a felony.  Kent at 547-548. 
{¶ 97} On appeal, Kent challenged, on statutory and constitutional grounds, 
the juvenile court judge’s waiver of jurisdiction.  Although the Supreme Court 
made clear that juvenile court judges enjoy broad discretion in determining the facts 
of a given case, it also emphasized that their exercise of that discretion was not “a 
license for arbitrary procedure.”  Kent, 383 U.S. at 553, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 
84.  In fact, the court explained, the District of Columbia’s waiver statute “requires 
a judgment in each case based on ‘an inquiry not only into the facts of the alleged 
offense but also into the question whether the parens patriae plan of procedure is 
desirable and proper in the particular case.’ ”  Id. at 553, fn. 15, quoting Pee v. 
United States, 274 F.2d 556, 559 (D.C.Cir.1959).  As the high court explained: 
 
The net, therefore, is that petitioner—then a boy of 16—was 
by statute entitled to certain procedures and benefits as a 
consequence of his statutory right to the “exclusive” jurisdiction of 
the Juvenile Court.  In these circumstances, considering particularly 
that decision as to waiver of jurisdiction and transfer of the matter 
to the District Court was potentially as important to petitioner as the 
difference between five years’ confinement and a death sentence, 
we conclude that, as a condition to a valid waiver order, petitioner 
was entitled to a hearing, including access by his counsel to the 
social records and probation or similar reports which presumably are 
considered by the court, and to a statement of reasons for the 
Juvenile Court’s decision.  We believe that this result is required by 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
44 
the statute read in the context of constitutional principles relating to 
due process and the assistance of counsel. 
 
Id. at 557. 
{¶ 98} Thus, the majority misunderstands Kent when it suggests that the 
Supreme Court held in that case only that “due process is satisfied when a juvenile 
court issues a decision stating its reasons for the transfer after conducting a hearing 
at which the juvenile is represented by counsel,” majority opinion at ¶ 24.  Kent 
requires much more. 
{¶ 99} For example, the court required that Kent’s counsel be given access 
to the child’s social records.  These were relevant to waiver because the “full 
investigation” required consideration of the “ ‘entire history of the child.’ ”  Kent 
at 559, quoting Wakins v. United States, 343 F.2d 278, 282 (D.C.Cir.1964).  
Additionally, the court noted that a policy memorandum promulgated by the 
juvenile court regarding application of the District of Columbia’s waiver statute 
required that the juvenile court judge consider such factors as the “sophistication 
and maturity of the juvenile” and the juvenile’s prior contacts with the justice 
system.  Id. at 546, fn. 4, 566-567.  The scope of this investigation is analogous to 
the investigation required under Ohio’s discretionary-transfer provision, R.C. 
2151.12(C). 
{¶ 100} In sum, the Supreme Court’s decision in Kent exemplified its belief 
in the origins and purpose of the juvenile-justice system, which has emphasized 
individualized assessment of the juvenile followed by rehabilitation and 
reintegration into society, rather than rote assessments focused only on the child’s 
age and misconduct, with the ultimate goal of punishment.  See Hanning, 89 Ohio 
St.3d at 88-89, 728 N.E.2d 105, citing D’Ambra, A Legal Response to Juvenile 
Crime: Why Waiver of Juvenile Offenders Is Not a Panacea, 2 Roger Williams 
January Term, 2017 
 
45 
U.L.Rev. 277, 280 (1997); Kent, 383 U.S. at 554, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84.  
Kent cannot be read so narrowly as to support the majority’s holding here. 
{¶ 101} Using Kent as a guide, we turn to the nature of the mandatory-
transfer hearing under R.C. 2152.12(A) to determine whether it comports with the 
essentials of due process and fair treatment that instructed the court’s decision in 
Kent.  Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute requires some process—namely, a hearing 
for the limited purpose of determining the juvenile’s age and whether there is 
probable cause to believe that he or she committed a mandatory-transfer-eligible 
offense.  These determinations, however, are merely ministerial, thereby removing 
the juvenile court from its role as parens patriae.  The mandatory-transfer hearing 
bears the appearance of process but lacks meaningful “ceremony” by eliminating 
the opportunity for a full investigation into the child’s amenability to rehabilitation.  
See Kent at 554 (“We do not consider whether, on the merits, Kent should have 
been transferred; but there is no place in our system of law for reaching a result of 
such tremendous consequences without ceremony—without hearing, without 
effective assistance of counsel, without a statements of reasons”). 
{¶ 102} For example, in Ohio’s mandatory-transfer hearing, consideration 
of age is simply a mathematical calculation and does not involve consideration of 
the youth’s maturity or sophistication.  All that remains is a finding of probable 
cause to believe that the child committed a mandatory-transfer-eligible offense.  
And this is done as part of a limited process: “while the juvenile court has a duty to 
assess the credibility of the evidence and to determine whether the state has 
presented credible evidence going to each element of the charged offense, it is not 
permitted to exceed the limited scope of the bindover hearing or to assume the role 
of the ultimate fact-finder.”  A.J.S., 120 Ohio St.3d 185, 2008-Ohio-5307, 897 
N.E.2d 629, at ¶ 44.  Additionally, the state’s evidence need not be unassailable, 
and the state has no burden to disprove alternate theories of the case.  Id. at ¶ 46, 
61. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
46 
{¶ 103} The consequences of transfer as a result of such perfunctory 
procedure are indeed tremendous.  Once a juvenile has been transferred to adult 
court, the state need not prosecute the mandatory-transfer-eligible offense.  For 
example, in this case, Aalim pleaded guilty in the common pleas court’s adult 
division to aggravated robbery, but the state dismissed the firearm specifications.  
Without those specifications in juvenile court, Aalim would not have been subject 
to mandatory transfer.  Nonetheless, Aalim’s convictions in adult court for offenses 
that no longer were eligible for mandatory transfer carried the weight of adult 
punishment and its attendant collateral consequences. 
{¶ 104} Thus, although the majority heralds the “process” attendant to the 
superficial hearing provided under Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute, it does not 
approach the United States Supreme Court’s vision of a “critically important” 
proceeding at which a juvenile faces deprivation of the protections of the juvenile 
court system, nor does it provide the “ceremony” required of a decision with such 
tremendous consequences.  Kent, 383 U.S. at 560, 557, 554, 86 S.Ct. 1045, 16 
L.Ed.2d 84.  Accordingly, I would conclude that Ohio’s mandatory-transfer 
proceeding does not comply with the fundamental-fairness standard required for 
juvenile-transfer proceedings. 
{¶ 105} Given the majority’s failure today to recognize what the Supreme 
Court has repeatedly held regarding the rehabilitative potential of juvenile 
offenders and the importance of that determination in juvenile-transfer proceedings, 
this case implores a closer look by the high court.  See Miller, 567 U.S. at 478, 132 
S.Ct. 2455, 183 L.Ed.2d 407 (“mandatory punishment [of juveniles] disregards the 
possibility of rehabilitation even when the circumstances most suggest it”); 
Graham, 560 U.S. at 68, 130 S.Ct. 2011, 176 L.Ed.2d 825 (“Juveniles are more 
capable of change than are adults, and their actions are less likely to be evidence of 
‘irretrievably depraved character’ ”), quoting Roper, 543 U.S. at 870, 125 S.Ct. 
1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1; Roper at 571 (“From a moral standpoint it would be 
January Term, 2017 
 
47 
misguided to equate the failings of a minor with those of an adult, for a greater 
possibility exists that a minor’s character deficiencies will be reformed.  Indeed, 
‘[t]he relevance of youth as a mitigating factor derives from the fact that the 
signature qualities of youth are transient; as individuals mature, the impetuousness 
and recklessness that may dominate in younger years can subside’ ”), quoting 
Johnson v. Texas, 509 U.S. 350, 368, 113 S.Ct. 2658, 125 L.Ed.2d 290 (1993). 
{¶ 106} In the context of juvenile transfer to adult court, the Supreme Court 
has remained silent since Kent.  This fosters confusion as to what authority state 
legislatures have to enact mandatory-transfer statutes with limited or no process 
given the unclear standards for which, if any, procedural and substantive 
protections juveniles are entitled to prior to transfer to adult court.  And this court, 
like all state courts (which handle almost all of the nation’s juvenile criminal cases), 
is in need of guidance given the paucity of constitutional guideposts and the 
dramatic increase in the states’ use of mandatory transfer after Kent and Gault—
transfers that, as explained above, were intended to preclude juveniles’ 
rehabilitation to allow for their harsher punishment.  This is particularly true given 
that the Supreme Court consistently has made clear over the last decade that in 
matters of punishment, we must at a minimum consider youth as a factor.  See, e.g., 
Miller at 478; Graham at 68; Roper at 571.  In so doing, the court has reminded us, 
repeatedly, that “[a] child’s age is far ‘more than a chronological fact.’ ”  J.D.B., 
564 U.S. at 272, 131 S.Ct. 2394, 180 L.Ed.2d 310, quoting Eddings v. Oklahoma, 
455 U.S. 104, 115, 102 S.Ct. 869, 71 L.Ed.2d 1 (1982).  “Indeed, the court has 
seemed frustrated that it has repeatedly noted to us that minors are less mature and 
responsible than adults, that they are lacking in experience, perspective, and 
judgment, and that they are more vulnerable and susceptible to the pressures of 
peers than are adults.”  State v. Long, 138 Ohio St.3d 478, 2014-Ohio-849, 8 N.E.3d 
890, ¶ 33 (O’Connor, C.J., concurring), citing J.D.B. at 274-275. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
48 
{¶ 107} Although Aalim I was decided solely on the Ohio Constitution’s 
due-process clause, see Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __, 
at ¶ 25, 31, the majority eschews any distinction between our state Constitution and 
the United States Constitution for purposes of due-process analysis.  Thus, today’s 
opinion is ripe for further review under the United States Supreme Court’s authority 
to define the protections and limits of the federal Constitution.  See, e.g., Grannis 
v. Ordean, 234 U.S. 385, 394, 34 S.Ct. 779, 58 L.Ed. 1363 (1914) (“the question 
whether the process thus sanctioned by the court of last resort of the state constitutes 
due process of law within the meaning of the 14th Amendment being properly 
presented to this court for decision, we must exercise an independent judgment 
upon it”). 
CONCLUSION 
{¶ 108} “A fundamental requirement of due process is ‘the opportunity to 
be heard.’  It is an opportunity which must be granted at a meaningful time and in 
a meaningful manner.”  Armstrong v. Manzo, 380 U.S. 545, 552, 85 S.Ct. 1187, 14 
L.Ed.2d 62 (1965), quoting Grannis at 394.  A hearing in which there is no 
consideration of a juvenile’s amenability to rehabilitation and treatment in the 
juvenile-justice system is not a meaningful opportunity to be heard.  Because the 
limited process provided by Ohio’s mandatory-transfer statute falls short of due 
process and fundamental fairness for the juvenile, I would conclude that it is 
unconstitutional. 
{¶ 109} I do not quarrel with the notion that a juvenile who commits a 
serious, violent crime should be punished or that transfer to adult court is proper in 
some instances.  See, e.g., State v. Watson, 47 Ohio St.3d 93, 547 N.E.2d 1181 
(1989) (holding that a juvenile court judge’s broad discretion to retain or relinquish 
jurisdiction included discretion to order the transfer of a 15-year-old male with no 
prior criminal record, no major disciplinary issues at school, and no psychiatric 
disorder because he had beaten another juvenile to death with a tree limb).  But the 
January Term, 2017 
 
49 
suggestion that this court is not authorized to invalidate a transfer statute that does 
not pass constitutional muster offends the doctrines of separation of powers and 
checks and balances, both hallmarks of our republic.  Here, the mandatory-transfer 
statute is one of those legislative enactments that falls constitutionally short.  The 
majority’s decision ignores that juveniles are entitled to a liberty interest that cannot 
be arbitrarily deprived, and reduces the role of juvenile court judges, who are 
elected by the people to determine, among other things, whether a juvenile is 
amenable to rehabilitation.  For these reasons, and knowing that “history has its 
eyes on” us, I cannot give countenance to the majority’s decision on 
reconsideration.  See Lin Manuel-Miranda, “History Has Its Eyes On You,” 
Hamilton (Original Broadway Cast Recording). 
 
O’NEILL, J., concurs in the foregoing opinion. 
_________________ 
O’NEILL, J., dissenting. 
{¶ 110} Respectfully, I dissent.  For the reasons explained in my dissenting 
opinion in State v. Gonzalez, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2017-Ohio-777, __N.E.3d __ ¶ 73, 
I disagree with the decision to reconsider this case in order to vacate our prior 
holding.  As in Gonzalez, there is nothing new to reconsider here; the only thing 
that has changed is the makeup of this court as a result of the 2016 election.  I am 
compelled instead to defend the constitutional right that we declared in State v. 
Aalim, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __ (“Aalim I”). 
{¶ 111} Last term, we declared that all children, including appellant, 
Matthew I. Aalim, “are entitled to fundamental fairness in the procedures by which 
they may be transferred out of juvenile court for criminal prosecution, and an 
amenability hearing like the one required in the discretionary-transfer provisions of 
[R.C. 2152.12(B)] is required to satisfy that fundamental fairness.”  Aalim I at ¶ 26.  
Instead of using the discretionary-transfer provisions in this case, however, the 
juvenile court transferred Aalim to adult court under the mandatory-transfer 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
50 
provisions of R.C. 2152.12(A) to face trial for aggravated robbery.  The distinction 
is significant.  The mandatory-transfer mechanism provides for a hearing only to 
determine whether there is probable cause to believe that the juvenile committed 
an enumerated serious crime and whether the juvenile was 16 or 17 years old at the 
time of the charged conduct.  R.C. 2152.12(A)(1) and 2152.02(BB) and (CC).  
Under this procedure, the juvenile court does not use its expertise and discretion to 
determine whether this pathway to justice is appropriate for this juvenile.  It is a 
formulaic solution to a complex situation.  It is the legislature’s way of saying, “If 
you are a juvenile offender you will be treated fairly—unless you have committed 
a serious crime.”  As a remedy for the violation of the constitutional right that we 
recognized, we reversed Aalim’s convictions and remanded the matter to the 
juvenile court for an amenability hearing.  Aalim I at ¶ 32. 
{¶ 112} We based our decision in Aalim I on the history and development 
of the justice system’s treatment of children charged with criminal misconduct.  Id. 
at ¶ 14-24.  Today, the majority abandons Aalim I’s acknowledgment that “children 
are constitutionally required to be treated differently from adults,” id. at ¶ 25.  
Today’s ruling carves out an exception to that different treatment for 16- and 17-
year-olds who commit serious crimes.  And in the process, it discards the 
fundamental fairness that is due to the children who are arguably most in need of a 
special inquiry prior to being tossed into the adult criminal-justice system. 
{¶ 113} In a bygone era, children were entitled not to life, liberty, or 
property but merely “to custody.”  In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1, 17, 87 S.Ct. 1428, 18 
L.Ed.2d 527 (1967).  Children were therefore treated by the state the same way that 
they are treated by their parents, and children did not receive the benefit of “the 
requirements which restrict the state when it seeks to deprive a person of his 
liberty.”  Id.  This proved to be an intolerable state of affairs, often leading to unfair 
and arbitrary results.  Id. at 17-22.  In the modern era, courts must provide children 
with procedures that “ ‘measure up to the essentials of due process and fair 
January Term, 2017 
 
51 
treatment.’ ”  Id. at 30, quoting Kent v. United States, 383 U.S. 541, 562, 86 S.Ct. 
1045, 16 L.Ed.2d 84 (1966). 
{¶ 114} Our holding in Aalim I, put in its simplest form, was that the state 
cannot establish a juvenile-justice system that purports to treat every person under 
the age of 18 as a “child” until transfer has occurred, R.C. 2152.02(C), and then 
deny some of those children the protections of transfer procedures that “account for 
the differences in children versus adults.”  Aalim I, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-
8278, __ N.E.3d __, at ¶ 24-25. 
{¶ 115} Our decision in Aalim I was grounded in principles of both 
procedural and substantive due process.  Procedural due process requires “ ‘such 
procedural protections as the particular situation demands.’ ”  Mathews v. Eldridge, 
424 U.S. 319, 334, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 (1976), quoting Morrissey v. 
Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 481, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484 (1972).  “The 
fundamental requirement of due process is the opportunity to be heard ‘at a 
meaningful time and in a meaningful manner.’ ”  Id. at 333, quoting Armstrong v. 
Manzo, 380 U.S. 545, 552, 85 S.Ct. 1187, 14 L.Ed.2d 62 (1965).  The government’s 
overriding purposes in the area of juvenile dispositions under R.C. Chapter 2152 
are “to provide for the care, protection, and mental and physical development of 
children subject to this chapter, protect the public interest and safety, hold the 
offender accountable for the offender’s actions, restore the victim, and rehabilitate 
the offender.”  R.C. 2152.01(A).  On balance, and in light of the government’s role 
with regard to children, I believe that a juvenile-transfer hearing cannot be 
“meaningful” within the requirements of procedural due process without 
procedures like those found in the discretionary-transfer provisions of R.C. 
2152.10(B) and 2152.12(B), which require consideration of factors relevant to the 
overriding purposes of the juvenile-justice system declared in R.C. 2152.01(A). 
{¶ 116} Aalim I was grounded in principles of substantive due process as 
well.  Substantive due process represents, at its core, the balance between “the 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
52 
liberty of the individual” and “the demands of organized society.”  Poe v. Ullman, 
367 U.S. 497, 542, 81 S.Ct. 1752, 6 L.Ed.2d 989 (1961) (Harlan, J., dissenting).  
This balance between liberty and order was 
 
struck by this country, having regard to what history teaches are the 
traditions from which it developed as well as the traditions from 
which it broke.  That tradition is a living thing.  A decision of this 
Court which radically departs from it could not long survive, while 
a decision which builds on what has survived is likely to be sound. 
 
Id.  In Aalim I, we recounted the numerous ways in which we, as a self-aware and 
ever-evolving society, have developed a new tradition: the recognition that children 
are childlike.  See __ Ohio St.3d __, 2016-Ohio-8278, __ N.E.3d __, at ¶ 21-23.  
Liberty therefore demands special treatment for children regardless of the 
momentary whims of our organized society.  See id. at ¶ 24-26.  Our decision in 
Aalim I was not some radical departure from our national tradition.  It was the 
expression of our social conscience. 
{¶ 117} The new majority position has been explicitly rejected by the 
United States Supreme Court.  See Planned Parenthood of Southeastern 
Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 847-848, 112 S.Ct. 2791, 120 L.Ed.2d 674 
(1992) (“Neither the Bill of Rights nor the specific practices of States at the time of 
the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment marks the outer limits of the substantive 
sphere of liberty which the Fourteenth Amendment protects”).  The new majority 
in this matter approaches the development of our constitutional guarantee of due 
process “in a literalistic way, as if we had a tax statute before us,” instead of 
approaching our Constitution as what it truly is: “the basic charter of our society, 
setting out in spare but meaningful terms the principles of government,” Poe at 540 
January Term, 2017 
 
53 
(Harlan, J., dissenting).  For these reasons, I disagree with the majority and would 
leave our judgment in Aalim I undisturbed. 
{¶ 118} Today’s decision is a mistake, and it should be treated that way.  
Aalim I was issued on December 22, 2016.  From that day until today, it has been 
the law of Ohio that R.C. 2152.10(A) and 2152.12(A) are incompatible with the 
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  Aalim I at ¶ 12-26.  On 
that day, we held that R.C. 2152.10(A) and 2152.12(A) were not enforceable.  
Nothing has changed since that date other than the makeup of this court. 
{¶ 119} For the foregoing reasons, I dissent. 
_________________ 
Mathias H. Heck Jr., Montgomery County Prosecuting Attorney, and 
Andrew T. French, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
 
Amanda J. Powell; and Timothy Young, Ohio Public Defender, and 
Charlyn Bohland, Assistant Public Defender, for appellant.  
 
Ron O’Brien, Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney, and Steven L. Taylor, 
Chief Counsel, Appellate Division, urging reconsideration for amicus curiae, Ohio 
Prosecuting Attorneys Association. 
_________________