Opinion ID: 2359432
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: State v. Heaton-Jones

Text: On the evidence before us, we find the following facts. On August 28, 1983, the Pittsfield police arrested two 13-year-old boys, Michael C. Day and John Heaton-Jones, on 14 identical charges. The juvenile intake worker released the boys to the custody of their parents. The boys were not formally charged until several months later, when they were scheduled to make their first appearance in District Court (Skowhegan) on November 30, 1983. The lawyer engaged for Michael Day entered an appearance by mail on behalf of his young client. Judge Benoit set January 9, 1984, for the adjudication hearing in Day's case, leaving him in the custody of his parents. John Heaton-Jones, however, had no lawyer and was accompanied only by his mother when he appeared before Judge Benoit at the scheduled time on November 30. The judge advised Heaton-Jones of his right to counsel and arranged for the appointment of a lawyer to represent the juvenile in subsequent proceedings. Judge Benoit took no evidence at the session with the boy and his mother. The judge set the Heaton-Jones case for hearing on January 9, 1984, the same day that was set for the co-respondent's case; but he ordered Heaton-Jones taken immediately to the Maine Youth Center in South Portland for detention pending the adjudication hearing, then nearly six weeks away. Judge Benoit entered that detention order despite the fact that Heaton-Jones's juvenile intake worker had left him in his mother's custody since August and at no time requested the judge to order detention. [13] The Heaton-Jones boy regained his freedom only through a writ of habeas corpus issued by the Superior Court on December 6, 1983. Judge Benoit's order detaining a juvenile for a period of nearly six weeks, before the boy had the assistance of counsel, and without the court's taking any evidence, ignored the most basic liberties and procedural requirements of law. The constitutional requirement of counsel at a hearing that results in the incarceration of a juvenile is beyond question. [14] Similarly, confining a juvenile without receiving any evidence whatever was inconsistent with minimal due process requirements. [15] By denying Heaton-Jones his fundamental rights, Judge Benoit committed an error that was obvious and of a most serious nature. Although Judge Benoit also failed to comply with section 3203 of the Juvenile Code, we need not consider that failure to reach our conclusion. With only the complaint before him, Judge Benoit proceeded summarily to deprive Heaton-Jones of his basic right of liberty. Such action cannot be the product of a mere oversight or of a mere misreading of the law. We find as a fact that Judge Benoit knew or clearly ought to have known that the detention of Heaton-Jones was unlawful. Moreover, Judge Benoit's actions in this case are disturbing because they demonstrate an arbitrary and unfair course of conduct. The Judge accorded radically different treatment to the two identically situated juveniles. Michael Day had an attorney to represent him, and because that attorney entered an appearance for Day in a letter to the court clerk, Judge Benoit took no action on Day's case until January 9. In contrast, Heaton-Jones, who was charged with jointly participating with Day in the same unlawful activities, appeared personally on the date he was summoned. Judge Benoit ordered him into custody, at an institution about one hundred miles away from his home, for nearly six weeks pending the January hearing. We find that a reasonably prudent and competent judge would consider that Judge Benoit's actions in this case were obviously and seriously wrong. He thus committed a sanctionable violation of Canon 3 A(1) of the Code of Judicial Conduct.