Court Opinion

ID: 9664252
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:10:16.866552+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:03.777673
License: Public Domain

MEYER, Justice
(dissenting).
DISSENT
I respectfully dissent. The district court used three adjudications of juvenile delinquency to increase McFee’s sentence beyond what would otherwise be authorized by the jury verdict or guilty plea alone. I would conclude that the use of juvenile adjudications to enhance McFee’s sentence violates his rights under the Sixth Amendment because juvenile adjudications do not fit into the “prior conviction exception” of Apprendi v. New Jersey and Blakely v. Washington.
The central question in this case is the meaning of the “prior conviction exception” as articulated by the United States Supreme Court and our court. The Supreme Court has made it clear that “ ‘any fact that increases the penalty for a crime beyond the prescribed statutory maximum must be submitted to a jury, and proved beyond a reasonable doubt.’ ” Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296, 301, 124 S.Ct. 2531, 159 L.Ed.2d 403 (2004) (quoting Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 490, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000)). The only exception to this rule is the “fact of a prior conviction.” Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 490, 120 S.Ct. 2348.
The prior conviction exception to the Apprendi rule arose out of the Supreme Court’s earlier decision in Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224, 118 S.Ct. 1219, 140 L.Ed.2d 350 (1998). In Almendarez-Torres, the Court upheld a defendant’s sentence that had been increased because the defendant had admitted in his guilty plea that he had three prior convictions. Id. at 226-27, 248, 118 S.Ct. 1219. The Court held that because of “ ‘the distinct nature of the issue,’ ” id. at 244, 118 S.Ct. 1219 (quoting Graham v. West Virginia, 224 U.S. 616, 629, 32 S.Ct. 583, 56 L.Ed. 917 (1912)), that issue being recidivism, and because recidivism “is a traditional, if not the most traditional, basis for a sentencing court’s increasing an offender’s sentence,” id. at 243, 118 S.Ct. 1219, the fact of the defendant’s prior felony convictions did not have to be proven to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. at 247, 118 S.Ct. 1219.
The next year, the Supreme Court explained that Almendarez-Torres dealt with a very narrow fact question and described why prior convictions did not have to be submitted to a jury: “[Ujnlike virtually any other consideration used to enlarge the possible penalty for an offense, * * * a prior conviction must itself have been established through procedures satisfying the fair notice, reasonable doubt, and jury trial guarantees.” Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 249, 119 S.Ct. 1215, 143 L.Ed.2d 311 (1999) (emphasis added).
In Apprendi, decided one term later, the Supreme Court stated that the prior con*620viction exception is “a narrow exception to the general rule” and “represents at best an exceptional departure from the historic practice that [a defendant has a right to a jury determination of any fact that increases the penalty for a crime beyond the statutory maximum].” Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 487, 490, 120 S.Ct. 2348. Apprendi iterated the Court’s explanation in Jones that “the certainty that procedural safeguards attached to any ‘fact’ of prior conviction” justified the exception. Id. at 488, 120 S.Ct. 2348.
Our court has endorsed the Supreme Court’s narrow exception to Apprendi We have stated in plain terms that “[t]he primary reason for excluding a prior conviction from the constitutional rule is that the prior conviction itself has been established by procedures that satisfy constitutional jury-trial and reasonable-doubt guarantees.” State v. Allen, 706 N.W.2d 40, 47 (Minn.2005) (emphasis added). Thus, the narrow prior conviction exception exists because, among other procedural safeguards, the defendant had a right to a jury trial in the prior proceeding.
In this case, the use of McFee’s prior adult criminal activity was constitutional; the existence of those convictions did not have to be submitted to a jury because a jury trial right had attached to them and because they fit into the traditional basis for increasing a sentence. McFee’s juvenile adjudications, in contrast, had no jury trial right attached to them and as quasi-civil, rehabilitative adjudications, they do not fit into the traditional basis for increasing a sentence. Juvenile adjudications do not fit into the prior conviction exception.
Minnesota law plainly defines juvenile adjudications as fundamentally different from convictions. Our law provides that “[no] child [shall] be deemed criminal by reason of [a delinquency] adjudication, nor shall th[e ] adjudication be deemed a conviction of crime.” Minn.Stat. § 260B.245, subd. 1 (2002) (emphasis added). Juvenile adjudications are not crimes and juveniles do not serve sentences. The goal of juvenile court is to rehabilitate the child. See MinmStat. § 260B.198, subd. 1 (2002). By treating and rehabilitating children, the state is relieved of the responsibility to give children the right to a jury trial. See McKeiver v. Pennsylvania, 403 U.S. 528, 545, 91 S.Ct. 1976, 29 L.Ed.2d 647 (1971) (holding that juvenile court proceedings are not criminal prosecutions under the Sixth Amendment and the jury trial right does not attach). The distinction between juvenile court proceedings and criminal trials is supposed to work to the child’s benefit. See McKeiver, 403 U.S. at 547, 91 S.Ct. 1976 (requiring jury trials would inhibit the ability of juvenile courts to effectively carry out their rehabilitative role).
The majority asserts that cases and commentators have signaled a “change in thinking about the juvenile court system away from one premised solely upon rehabilitation.” In particular, the majority asserts that certain legislative action has “changed how juvenile adjudications could be used.” If what the majority suggests is true, that juvenile court is now more focused on punishment than rehabilitation and juvenile adjudications are more akin to convictions than they used to be, then it brings into serious question the vitality of McKeiver’s fundamental principle that the rehabilitation model for juvenile court justifies the denial of the right to a trial by jury. If juvenile adjudications are akin to convictions, then it follows that they are entitled to all of the procedural protections that accompany such a classification. As the Louisiana Supreme Court wrote: “If a juvenile adjudication, with its lack of a right to a jury trial which is afforded adult criminals, can then be [used to enhance an adult sentence] the same as a felony con-*621vietion * * * then ‘the entire claim of par-ens patriae becomes a hypocritical mockery.’ ” State v. Brown, 879 So.2d 1276, 1289 (La.2004) (citation omitted). Either we install jury trials in juvenile courts if the disposition is primarily punitive rather than rehabilitative, or we reaffirm the principles of rehabilitation in juvenile court and continue the distinction between juvenile adjudications and adult criminal convictions.
The majority’s new rule significantly expands Apprendi’s prior conviction exception in a way that is completely at odds with the Supreme Court’s unwavering commitment to a narrow definition of a prior conviction. The majority’s new rule is that prior juvenile delinquency adjudication may be used to increase a defendant’s sentence for a later crime because the fact of a juvenile adjudication, like an adult conviction, is so “reliable” that due process of law is not violated. The majority essentially concludes that because a judge can “reliably” determine the fact of a juvenile adjudication, and because the juvenile adjudications “met all due process requirements that attached to that proceeding,” McFee does not have a Sixth Amendment right to a jury determination of the facts that increased his prison sentence. The majority borrows this “reliability” test from various courts around the country.
The first federal appeals court to consider the precise issue in this case was the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Tighe, 266 F.3d 1187, 1194 (9th Cir.2001). That court held that juvenile adjudications “do not fall within Appren-di’s ‘prior conviction’ exception” for the reason that the right to a jury trial was integral to the exception. Id. (holding that the prior conviction exception “was premised on sentence-enhancing prior convictions being the product of proceedings that afford crucial procedural protections — particularly the right to a jury trial and proof beyond a reasonable doubt”). The Ninth Circuit indicated that a contrary holding would have been an extension of the Supreme Court’s holding in Almendarez-Torre s, and that language from Apprendi counseled against making such an extension. Tighe, 266 F.3d at 1194 (quoting Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 489-90, 120 S.Ct. 2348).1
State supreme courts are equally divided on whether the prior conviction exception should be extended to juvenile adjudications. Compare State v. Harris, 339 Or. 157, 118 P.3d 236, 246 (2005) (holding “the Sixth Amendment requires that when [a juvenile] adjudication is offered as an enhancement factor to increase a criminal sentence, its existence must either be proved to a trier of fact or be admitted by a defendant for sentencing purposes following an informed and knowing waiver”), and State v. Brown, 879 So.2d 1276, 1289 (La.2004) (holding that a juvenile “adjudication should not be counted as a ‘prior conviction’ for Apprendi purposes”), with Ryle v. State, 842 N.E.2d 320, 323 (Ind.2005) (holding that juvenile adjudications are prior convictions for purposes of Ap-prendi rule and indicating that “[t]he main concern was whether the prior conviction’s procedural safeguards ensured a reliable result, not that there had to be a right to a jury trial”), and State v. Hitt, 273 Kan. 224, 42 P.3d 732, 740 (2002) (“Juvenile adjudications are included within the historical cloak of recidivism and enjoy ample procedural safeguards; therefore, the Ap-prendi exception for prior convictions encompasses juvenile adjudications.”). Both the Indiana and Kansas Supreme Courts appear to have based their decisions, at least in part, on their belief that an oppo*622site ruling would result in a large number of appealed sentences. See Ryle, 842 N.E.2d at 323 (“A decision to require the jury to determine the ‘fact’ of prior juvenile adjudications would result in an untold number of defendants clogging the trial courts on remand * * *.”); Hitt, 42 P.3d at 740 (“To remove juvenile adjudications from the [guideline] calculation would require the resentencing of many and result in lighter sentences for them and future defendants.”). These concerns have no legitimate place in an inquiry into whether a defendant’s Sixth Amendment rights have been violated.
In each of the cases relied on by the majority in which a court determined that juvenile adjudications fit within the prior conviction exception, the opinions expressly or implicitly held that the jury trial “circuitbreaker in the State’s machinery of justice” is not integral to the prior conviction exception. See Blakely, 542 U.S. at 306, 124 S.Ct. 2531. Those opinions arrived at that conclusion even though the Supreme Court has indicated that the pri- or conviction exception depended upon the satisfaction of the jury trial guarantee in the prior proceeding. Jones, 526 U.S. at 249, 119 S.Ct. 1215. In my view, it simply does not matter that an enhancement fact could be “reliably” determined by a judge; unless the fact is a prior conviction, the Sixth Amendment gives a defendant the right to demand a jury to find such a fact. See Blakely, 542 U.S. at 304, 124 S.Ct. 2531 (“When a judge inflicts punishment that the jury’s verdict alone does not allow, the jury has not found all the facts which the law makes essential to the punishment, and the judge exceeds his proper authority.” (internal citation and quotation marks omitted)). In concluding otherwise, the majority is expressing a variant of Justice Steven Breyer’s dissenting argument in Apprendi, rejected by the Court, that the proper inquiry is whether the procedures employed by the court result in a “fair functioning of the criminal justice system.” See 530 U.S. at 555, 120 S.Ct. 2348 (Breyer, J., dissenting).
The proper inquiry under Apprendi is not whether McFee’s juvenile adjudications were “fairly” or “reliably” determined. The proper inquiry is whether the fact of McFee’s prior juvenile adjudications was ever determined by a jury. See Apprendi 530 U.S. at 498-99, 120 S.Ct. 2348 (Scalia, J., concurring) (“What ultimately demolishes the case for the dissenters is that they are unable to say what the right to trial by jury does guarantee if, as they assert, it does not guarantee — what it has been assumed to guarantee throughout our history — the right to have a jury determine those facts that determine the maximum sentence the law allows.”). I see no reason to conclude, given the Supreme Court’s emphatic pronouncements on the separate importance of the right to a jury trial, that the Court did not mean to limit the prior conviction exception to prior proceedings “satisfying the fair notice, reasonable doubt, and jury trial guarantees.” Jones, 526 U.S. at 249, 119 S.Ct. 1215.2
Although the right to a jury trial provides fact reliability and due process guarantees, the “right is no mere procedural formality, but a fundamental reservation of power in our constitutional structure.” Blakely, 542 U.S. at 305-06, 124 S.Ct. 2531. As the Court said in Shepard v. United States, “the Sixth and Fourteenth *623Amendments guarantee a jury standing between a defendant and the power of the state, and they guarantee a jury’s finding of any disputed fact essential to increase the ceiling of a potential sentence.” 544 U.S. 13, 25, 125 S.Ct. 1254, 161 L.Ed.2d 205 (2005). That is, the jury trial right is not primarily focused on the reliability of the jury’s conclusions drawn from the facts, but rather on preventing the state from drawing conclusions from the facts without using a jury.3
In summary, because a juvenile adjudication is not “the fact of a prior conviction,” it cannot be used to increase a defendant’s sentence beyond that otherwise authorized. I would reverse and remand for resentencing.

. As the majority notes, other circuit courts have not followed Tighe’s lead.

. See also Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 496, 120 S.Ct. 2348 ("[T]here is a vast difference between accepting the validity of a prior judgment of conviction entered in a proceeding in which the defendant had the right to a jury trial and the right to require the prosecutor to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and allowing the judge to find the required fact under a lesser standard of proof.”).

. The majority attempts to buttress its conclusions by noting that "the role for a jury would be extremely limited in" determining the fact of prior juvenile adjudications. In so doing, the majority presumes away the concern that motivated the adoption of the jury trial right in the first place — democratic control over a potentially corruptible judiciary. See Blakely, 542 U.S. at 306, 124 S.Ct. 2531 ("Just as suffrage ensures the people’s ultimate control in the legislative and executive branches, jury trial is meant to ensure their control in the judiciary. ”).