Opinion ID: 1913722
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: policy choices

Text: In the present case, in considering an as applied constitutional challenge, we are again faced with difficult, competing policy choices, in a situation involving minors as defendants and victims. In B.B., we concluded that the purpose of section 794.05(1) was to protect minors from sex acts imposed by adults. 659 So.2d at 260 (quoting Victor v. State, 566 So.2d 354, 356 (Fla. 4th DCA 1990)), and, accordingly, we found the statute unconstitutional as applied in singling out one of two consenting sixteen-year-olds because it was not being utilized as a shield to protect a minor. Id. We find B.B. clearly distinguishable because while both defendant and victim were sixteen in that case, here we have two fifteen year-old boys engaging in sexual activity with two twelve-year-old girls. [12] As J.A.S.'s counsel acknowledged at oral argument, and we reaffirm here, twelve-year-old children are entitled to considerable protection by the State, even when some of them resist its extension to them. Fundamentally, our inquiry here involves weighing the State's legitimate interest in either regulating or forbidding the challenged conduct of the minors involved herein against the minors' privacy rights under article I, section 23 of the Florida Constitution. [13] Consistent with that approach, and with our prior analysis in Jones upholding the same statute, we find that as to the as applied challenge here, the scales clearly tip in favor of the State's compelling interest in protecting children from harmful sexual conduct. See Jones, 640 So.2d at 1086 (The State has the prerogative to safeguard its citizens, particularly children, from potential harm when such harm outweighs the interests of the individual.) (citing Griffin v. State, 396 So.2d 152 (Fla.1981)). Our conclusion is consistent with our particularized approach to similar privacy issues in B.B. and in Jones. We recognized in Jones that the Florida Legislature, [a]s evidenced by the number and breadth of the statutes concerning minors and sexual exploitation... has established an unquestionably strong policy interest in protecting minors from harmful sexual conduct. 640 So.2d at 1085. Moreover, [the] rights of privacy that have been granted to minors do not vitiate the legislature's efforts and authority to protect [them] from conduct of others. Id. at 1087. Although applied in the adult-minor context, our reasoning in Jones is equally applicable here in recognizing the State's compelling interest in protecting twelve-year-olds from older teenagers and from their own immaturity in choosing to participate in harmful activity. 640 So.2d at 1087 (finding that the State has an obligation and a compelling interest in protecting children from `sexual activity and exploitation before their minds and bodies have sufficiently matured to make it appropriate, safe, and healthy for them') (quoting Jones v. State, 619 So.2d 418, 424 (Fla. 5th DCA 1993) (Sharp, J., concurring specially)). On the other hand, we reasoned in B.B. that the statute was not being utilized as a shield to protect a minor, but rather, it [was] being used as a weapon to adjudicate a minor delinquent. B.B., 659 So.2d at 260. In contrast, under the circumstances presented here, we conclude that section 800.04 is being primarily utilized as a shield to protect the twelve-year-old girls, rather than a weapon to arbitrarily adjudicate the fifteen-year-old boys as delinquents. While we agree that the trial court, based upon its actual experience, has identified a potential legitimate concern in the observation that the boys are always charged by the state when sexual misconduct is alleged involving minors, we do not find that concern implicated or determinative here. As already repeatedly noted, the facts here are clearly distinguishable from those in B.B. where such a concern may have merited further exploration. Further, in accord with our reasoning in T.W., 551 So.2d at 1193, that a minor's rights are not absolute, we again decline to find that a minor has an open-ended privacy right in carnal intercourse with another minor, of any age, that shields the minor from adjudication as a delinquent. Counterposed against respect for the privacy rights of [e]very natural person, including minors, is the legislature's legitimate concern with the social problems engendered by minors' sexual activity. On that subject, we agree, for example, that the statute evinces a policy that sex in early adolescence is a dangerous folly that the state clearly does not condone. Jones, 640 So.2d at 1087 n. 5 (Kogan, J., concurring). [14] We conclude that whatever privacy interest a fifteen-year-old minor has in carnal intercourse is clearly outweighed by the State's interest in protecting twelve-year-old children from harmful sexual conduct, irrespective of whether the twelve-year-old consented to the sexual activity. We simply cannot ignore the State's weighty interest in protecting the twelve-year-old girls from harmful sexual conduct for reasons of health and quality of life, B.B., 659 So.2d at 259, and from possible sexual exploitation by the older minors. See J.A.S., 686 So.2d at 1369 (reasoning that minors under sixteen have no unfettered right to engage in recreational sex with others under sixteen because the costs and risks to society and the children involved are far too great). Therefore, we conclude that section 800.04, as applied herein, furthers the compelling interest of the State in the health and welfare of its children, through the least intrusive means, by prohibiting such conduct and attaching reasonable sanctions through the rehabilitative juvenile justice system. [15] See P.W.G. v. State, 702 So.2d 488, 491 (Fla.1997) (Given the different goals of the juvenile delinquency and the adult criminal systems, and the former's emphasis on rehabilitation as the principal means by which to achieve the goal of preventing delinquent children from becoming adult offenders, we believe that it is constitutionally permissible for the trial court to impose whatever treatment plan it concludes is most likely to be effective for a particular child, as long as that plan does not pose a significant threat to the health or well-being of the child.). While education and counseling are obvious means of addressing the State's concerns, we do not find it unreasonable for the State to include the invocation of juvenile sanctions in particular instances such as the ones presented here as an additional means of protecting children. Stated another way, the more compelling the interest under the particular circumstances, the more leeway the State will be afforded. We recognize that it would simplify privacy analysis if we could fashion a precise equation by which all could easily determine which interest should prevail in whatever context a privacy right is asserted. In cases like this, all interested parties legitimately seek bright-line rules in determining whether the disputed conduct is sanctionable in the juvenile or criminal justice systems, or whether the activity falls within the constitutionally-protected zone of privacy established for certain forms of intimate human conduct. However, the human experience is not so easily categorized or quantified and no single formula can be crafted for deciding issues which implicate the most personal and intimate forms of conduct and privacy, especially where children are involved. If we blinded ourselves to the unique facts of each case, we would render decisions in a vacuum with no thought to the serious consequences of our decisions for the affected parties and society in general.