Court Opinion

ID: 9535534
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:50:35.253334+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:16.721826
License: Public Domain

Murphy, C. J.,

dissenting:

I agree with the Court that a juvenile’s personal need for juvenile rehabilitative services is distinct from the question of his parent’s ability to pay restitution to compensate for his delinquent act. Obviously the decision to charge a juvenile under a delinquency petition cannot turn on the failure of the parent to promise or pay restitution. I cannot, however, agree with the Court that the State’s action in filing the delinquency petition in this case constituted an intentional and purposeful discrimination violative of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
As the record discloses, and as the Court of Special Appeals held, the intake supervisor, who was the sole witness at the hearing on the appellant’s motion to dismiss, testified that the intake records demonstrated that the appellant “had some *631emotional problems” and that, unlike the parents of his codefendants, the appellant’s mother refused to accept custody following his arrest, resulting in his being detained overnight in a juvenile home. In view of this evidence, the Court of Special Appeals concluded that the reasons for the filing of the petition precluded a finding of unjustifiable discrimination. It said that the basis for the decision to file the petition included non-economic factors based on the interests of the child or the public which necessitated that juvenile services be provided to effect the appellant’s rehabilitation.
I, therefore, would affirm the judgment.
Judge Orth has authorized me to state that he concurs in the views expressed herein.