Opinion ID: 1360636
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Federal Equal Protection Analysis

Text: The United States Supreme Court has examined equal protection challenges to recoupment statutes under the rational relationship test. See Fuller, 417 U.S. at 49, 94 S.Ct. at 2122 (Our task is merely to determine whether there is `some rationality in the nature of the class singled out.') (qutoing Rinaldi v. Yeager, 384 U.S. 305, 308, 86 S.Ct. 1497, 1499, 16 L.Ed.2d 577 (1966)); Strange, 407 U.S. at 140, 92 S.Ct. at 2034 (stating that requirement of rationality in classification was not met). Although Strange involved a challenge to a recoupment statute's denial of execution exemptions and not to the procedures employed in reaching the judgment, use of the rational relationship test is proper. There is no suspect class or fundamental right at issue. Appellees apparently concede that the rational relationship test is appropriate, arguing that Rule 39 has no rational relationship to a legitimate governmental interest. As discussed above, the purpose of Rule 39's classification is legitimate. The means chosen are rationally related to that end, in that more efficient procedures are justified by the simplified issues at stake. See Amor, 114 Cal. Rptr. at 772, 523 P.2d at 1180 (holding that recoupment statute did not violate equal protection despite providing different procedures than those available to other debtors). Criminal Rule 39 therefore does not violate the federal constitutional right to equal protection.