Opinion ID: 2453310
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

Text: ¶ 14 The Fourteenth Amendment essentially provides that a state may not deprive persons of life, liberty, or property without providing them with due process of law. U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1. The due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment confers both procedural and substantive protections. Amunrud v. Bd. of Appeals, 158 Wash.2d 208, 216, 143 P.3d 571 (2006) (citing Albright v. Oliver, 510 U.S. 266, 114 S.Ct. 807, 127 L.Ed.2d 114 (1994)). At issue here is E.S.'s claim that she was denied procedural due process. When a state seeks to deprive a person of a protected interest, procedural due process requires that an individual receive notice of the deprivation and an opportunity to be heard to guard against erroneous deprivation. Id. (citing Mathews, 424 U.S. at 334, 96 S.Ct. 893). The opportunity to be heard must be ``at a meaningful time and in a meaningful manner,'' appropriate to the case. Id. (quoting Mathews, 424 U.S. at 333, 96 S.Ct. 893 (quoting Armstrong v. Manzo, 380 U.S. 545, 552, 85 S.Ct. 1187, 14 L.Ed.2d 62 (1965))). `[D]ue process, unlike some legal rules, is not a technical conception with a fixed content unrelated to time, place and circumstances.' Mathews, 424 U.S. at 334, 96 S.Ct. 893 (alteration in original) (quoting Cafeteria & Rest. Workers Union Local 473 v. McElroy, 367 U.S. 886, 895, 81 S.Ct. 1743, 6 L.Ed.2d 1230 (1961)). `[D]ue process is flexible and calls for such procedural protections as the particular situation demands.' Id. (alteration in original) (quoting Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484 (1972)). Under the Mathews balancing test, cited above, a court must consider three factors in identifying the due process that a person is entitled to receive in a particular circumstance: (1) the private interest that will be affected by the official action; (2) 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 (3) the [g]overnment's interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail. Id. at 335, 96 S.Ct. 893. ¶ 15 E.S. contends that three of her private interests are at stake in this case, including physical liberty, bodily privacy, and education. With respect to the first of these interests, E.S. asserts that her physical liberty was threatened because the juvenile court's truancy order was a necessary and direct predicate to its later finding of contempt and imposition of a detention sanction consisting of home monitoring. E.S. contends in that regard that she was not afforded due process because at the point of contempt proceedings, no challenge to the original truancy finding is available. The District responds that due process concerns do not arise if, as here, deprivation of a child's physical liberty is merely potential or hypothetical. In support of its argument, the District points to the United States Supreme Court's decision that an indigent's right to appointed counsel is that such a right has been recognized to exist only where the litigant may lose his physical liberty if he loses the litigation and, accordingly, the `mere threat' of punishment is insufficient to require appointment of counsel. Lassiter v. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 452 U.S. 18, 25, 26, 101 S.Ct. 2153, 68 L.Ed.2d 640 (1981) (quoting Scott v. Illinois, 440 U.S. 367, 373, 99 S.Ct. 1158, 59 L.Ed.2d 383 (1979)). While it is true that the initial hearing with which we are here concerned must precede a contempt hearing, the mere possibility that an order in a hearing may later serve as the predicate for a contempt adjudication is not enough to entitle an indigent party therein to free legal assistance. Tetro v. Tetro, 86 Wash.2d 252, 255 n. 1, 544 P.2d 17 (1975); see also In re Truancy of Perkins, 93 Wash.App. 590, 969 P.2d 1101 (concluding that children are not entitled to appointed counsel at the initial truancy hearing), review denied, 138 Wash.2d 1003, 984 P.2d 1033 (1999). In our view, it is significant that contempt sanctions could not have been imposed against E.S. at the initial truancy hearing since a petition for contempt had not yet been filed. Indeed, as we have observed above, when the contempt petition was filed and there was a possibility that the juvenile court could deprive E.S. of her physical liberty, E.S. was provided with counsel. In sum, the truancy order that was issued at the initial hearing did not deprive E.S. of her physical liberty. ¶ 16 The second private interest that E.S. identifies is bodily privacy. E.S.'s counsel argues that E.S.'s private interest in her bodily privacy would be at stake if the court, under RCW 28A.225.035 and RCW 28A.225.090, required E.S. to submit to testing for the use of controlled substances or alcohol. Under RCW 28A.225.090(1)(e), a court has authority to order a child to submit to testing for the use of controlled substances or alcohol only if it makes a determination that such testing is appropriate to the circumstances and behavior of the child and will facilitate the child's compliance with the mandatory attendance law. We have recognized that, as a general proposition, school children have a lower expectation of privacy and that drug testing of students based on individualized suspicion, rather than suspicionless random testing, is permissible under our state constitution. York v. Wahkiakum Sch. Dist. No. 200, 163 Wash.2d 297, 308, 178 P.3d 995 (2008). [5] Because there was no basis for individualized suspicion of drug or alcohol use by E.S., the juvenile court properly did not order such testing. If there had been such a showing, the testing may well have been appropriate because we have recognized a lower expectation of privacy for students in Washington State, notwithstanding the fact that E.S. was then unrepresented. The fact is, however, that the juvenile court did not order testing, so there was no basis to intrude on E.S.'s bodily privacy at the initial truancy hearing. ¶ 17 The third private interest that E.S. denotes is her right to an education under article IX, section 1 of our state constitution. [6] Citing the Court of Appeals' reasoning, E.S. claims that a misguided decision made during an initial truancy hearing could disrupt the child's education by introducing or exacerbating stigma, uncertainty, and instability. Suppl. Resp't's Br. at 20 (citing Bellevue, 148 Wash.App. at 216, 199 P.3d 1010). We thoroughly disagree with this contention, and note that the overriding purpose of the compulsory school attendance and admission statute, chapter 28A.225 RCW, is to protect, rather than interfere with, the child's right to an education. Clearly, a child must attend school in order to receive the benefits that flow from the right to an education. It cannot be said that, by holding an initial truancy hearing to determine why E.S. refused to attend school and to establish a plan for her to begin attending school regularly, the juvenile court subtracted in any way from the State's paramount duty ... to make ample provision for E.S.'s education. [7] WASH. CONST. art. IX, § 1. Thus, we agree with the District's argument that the holding advanced by E.S. and adopted by the Court of Appeals would stand the aforementioned provision on its head. Pet'r's Suppl. Br. on State Constitutional Claim at 6. For the reasons explained above, we conclude that E.S. failed to show any private interest that was affected by the initial truancy hearing. ¶ 18 In regard to the second Mathews factor, the risk of erroneous deprivation, E.S. asks us to conclude that counsel should be appointed for a child facing an initial truancy hearing because the child, without benefit of counsel, is in danger of being disadvantaged in truancy proceedings. This would, she asserts, include the initial hearing, because of the child's limited ability to act and reason like an adult. We readily agree the child should be afforded appointed counsel at a contempt proceeding. That, though, is not an issue since a child is entitled to counsel at that stage. Indeed, as we have noted, E.S. had the benefit of counsel at her first and all subsequent contempt hearings. Furthermore, the initial hearing did not adversely affect any of E.S.'s private interests. While it may have been comforting to E.S. and her mother to have been accompanied by legal counsel at the initial hearing, the issues that are before the court at the initial hearing on a truancy petition are uncomplicated and straightforward. Indeed, the record shows that E.S. was able to explain to the juvenile court why she missed school. Faced with E.S.'s statements, the juvenile court judge told her that she needs to see the school nurse if she feels ill and that she could not skip more school days if she wanted to go on to the eighth grade. E.S. indicated that she understood what the judge was telling her and that she did not have additional problems at school that prevented her from attending regularly. By enacting RCW 28A.225.035, the legislature determined that appointed counsel is not required at initial truancy hearings, and we fail to see what would be gained if additional or substitute procedural safeguards were required at that stage. [8] ¶ 19 The third Mathews factor, governmental interests, is only briefly mentioned by E.S.'s counsel, who addresses only the countervailing government interest of cost and states that cost is uncertain and does not have controlling weight. Suppl. Resp't's Br. at 5. We believe that it is reasonable to conclude that costs would rise and additional administrative resources would be expended if an attorney had to be appointed whenever counsel is sought by a child at an initial truancy hearing. Therefore, the third Mathews factor does not weigh in favor of requiring counsel. ¶ 20 In sum, the Mathews analysis does not support the conclusion that counsel must be appointed at an initial truancy hearing. The fact is that the initial hearing at which E.S. was not represented by counsel had little or no adverse effect on her private interests and it presented little risk of an erroneous deprivation of any of the child's rights, including her right to an education. We, therefore, conclude that E.S. failed to meet her burden of proving that RCW 28A.225.035(10) is unconstitutional. While it is certainly within the province of the legislature to require the provision of counsel at an initial truancy hearing, that is a policy decision for the legislature and we will not intrude, under the guise of a constitutional directive, on what is clearly the legislature's prerogative.