In the Matter of the Welfare of JACK CHARLES LEWIS.
THE STATE OF WASHINGTON, on the Relation of Jack Charles Lewis et al., Plaintiff,
v.
THE SUPERIOR COURT FOR KING COUNTY, Michael K. Copass, Judge, Respondent.[1]
The Supreme Court of Washington, Department Two.
P.R. McIntosh, for relators.
N.P. Moats, for respondent.
Muriel Mawer, Charles O. Carroll, and Charles Z. Smith, amici curiae.
*195 ROSELLINI, J.
We are asked to review, on certiorari, proceedings involving the alleged delinquency of a fourteen-year-old boy, which culminated in an order directing that the boy should be made a ward of the court and placed in the Luther Burbank custodial school.
The relаtors, the boy and his parents, have raised a number of procedural objections and also challenge the constitutionality of the juvenile court act, RCW 13.04.010 et seq. A brief outline of the procedure that was followed will expedite the disposition of these questions.
On August 24, 1956, a petition was filed in the juvenile court, alleging Jack Charles Lewis to be a delinquent child. Notice and summons were served on the parents on September 4, 1956. On September 10th, the matter came on for hearing. The boy and his parents appeared through their attorney, filed a motion for transfer of the action, and demurred to the petition. The cause was then assigned to the presiding judge. On September 11th, an order was entered appointing Miss Muriel Mawеr guardian ad litem, and on September 14th, N.P. Moats was appointed attorney for the petitioner, a probation officer, the prosecuting attorney's office having declined a request by the court to represent him. A motion made by the guardian ad litem for physical and psychiatric examination of the boy was denied on September 14, 1956.
On September 18th, the causе came on for hearing before Honorable Michael K. Copass, one of the judges of the superior court. Over the objection of the attorney for the relators, the public and the witnesses were excluded from the courtroom. Motions to quash the appointment of the special prosecutor and the guardian ad litem were denied. The demurrer to the petition was overruled, but when it was renewed after the first witness was called, the court sustained the demurrer and, with the consent of the relators' attorney, gave the petitioner five days in which to amend. The parents were ordered to reappear with the boy on October 15, 1956. On September 26th, an amended petition was filed, and on October 15th, the matter came on for hearing with all of the interested parties present.
*196 The relators demurred to the amended petition on the ground that the alleged facts constituting delinquency were not stated in sufficient detail to enable them to defend against the accusations and on the ground that the verification on the petition did not show in what state and county it was signed. It having been shown to the satisfaction of the court that this was a stenographic oversight, the court allowed counsel for the petitioner to amend the petition to show that it was signed and verified in the state of Washington, county of King. The demurrer was overruled, and a motion to strike or, in the alternative, to make more definite and certain was denied.
A number of neighbors of the relators were called, who testified to the boy's habitual use of vulgar and profane language, to his various acts of intimidation of children in the neighborhood, and to conduct which indicated that young Lewis had little respect for the rights and dignity of others. A boys' club supervisor testified that, because he disrupted the games of other boys and used obsсene language, it had become necessary to exclude him from the club; and there was evidence that he had been transferred from one school to another, on request of his teachers and principals, and that eventually he was removed from school and given a home instructor. His difficulties at school involved behavior problems and also the fact that he was subject to a mild convulsive disorder. The latter, however, had been brought under satisfactory control by the use of medication prescribed by a neurologist. At the time of the hearing, he was not in school and was not receiving home instruction. He had at one time been taken to the Ryther Child Center, at the suggestion of the school authorities, аnd had been placed on the waiting list there.
The parents testified that they had no knowledge of his use of obscene language and that no complaints had been made to them about this. They testified that one neighbor had pulled his ear and another had turned the hose on him; that the police had unjustly accused him of taking another boy's bicycle without permission and had induced him to sign a confession which he had not read. It seemed to be *197 their opinion that all of the complaints against him were unfounded and that he was just an unusually active and aggressive boy.
The boy admitted the use of obscene language, but denied that he knew what it meant and also denied that he knew the meaning of a vulgar sign which he had made in the presеnce of several of the witnesses. He admitted molesting a retarded child in the neighborhood and also admitted several other acts of intimidation.
No other witnesses were called to refute the testimony of those called by the petitioner.
The court concluded that the boy was in need of help and asked the parents and the guardian ad litem to draw up suggеsted programs whereby the boy's problems could be corrected and he could be returned to school. On the appointed day, the two programs were submitted. The parents proposed to continue dealing with the boy as they had in the past and offered nothing constructive. The guardian ad litem had contacted the school authorities and the Ryther Child Centеr and obtained the consent of the latter to accept him immediately as an outpatient if the parents would co-operate. She recommended that his home study program should be reinstated and should continue until such time as his emotional problems had been corrected and he was able to return to school.
The court approvеd this program and asked the co-operation of the parents. They persisted in their view that there was nothing wrong with the boy and expressed their unwillingness to co-operate in the program. The court thereupon ordered the boy committed to the Luther Burbank school. However, upon being informed that the parents proposed to apply for a writ of certiorari, the trial court suspended its order pending this court's determination of the matter, contingent upon the parents' following the program proposed by the guardian ad litem during this interval. This they agreed to do.
Relators first object to the exclusion of the public from the hearing, contending that the provision of RCW 13.04.090, which permits the court to exclude the public in juvenile *198 court procеedings, violates Art. I, § 10 of the state constitution, which provides: "Justice in all cases shall be administered openly, and without unnecessary delay."
[1, 2] The purpose of excluding the public from proceedings such as these is, of course, to protect the child from notoriety and its ill effects. This court, along with by far the majority of other courts in the United States, early reсognized that the purpose of statutes such as ours is not to punish the child, but to inquire into his welfare where reasonable cause exists, and to provide an environment which will enable him to grow into a useful and happy citizen, where his parents have failed in that regard. In In re Lundy,
"The policy underlying this law is protection, not punishment. Its purpose is not to restrain criminals to the end that society may be protected and the criminal perchance reformed; it is to prevent the making of criminals."
This language was quoted with approval in Weber v. Doust,
Statutes similar to ours have been universally upheld over objections based upon constitutional grounds. The Pennsylvania supreme court declared in In re Holmes,
In the following cases, it was held that the failure to provide a jury in juvenile court proceedings did not render the acts in question uncоnstitutional: Cinque v. Boyd, 99 *199 Conn. 70,
One case is cited by the relators in support of their argument that the right to a public trial, guaranteed in criminal cases where justice (that is, punishment) is meted out, applies in a juvenilе court proceeding, where there is no issue of crime and no punishment. In that case, State v. Marsh,
Our research, while it has revealed many cases where other constitutional guarantees were made the basis for attacks upon juvenile court acts, has produced only one case where the question of the right to a public trial was raised. In Dendy v. Wilson,
[3] It would have been easier for the court, in this case, to accede to the relators' wishes and ignore the welfare of the child; but the court, recognizing the harm that would come to the child if his neighbors heard all of the testimony against him or if newsmen picked up the story, and recognizing further that no good purpose would be sеrved by having casual loiterers in the courtroom, made its ruling to protect the child rather than to please his parents, who admitted they had no good reason for requesting a public trial. We see no constitutional objection to the provision of the statute which allowed the court to make that ruling.
It is next urged that the court abused its discretion in appоinting a guardian ad litem to represent the interests of the child. The authority for such an appointment is found in RCW 13.04.070, which provides, inter alia:
"The parents of the child, if living, and their residence is known, or its legal guardian, if there be one or if there is neither parent nor guardian, or if his or her residence is not known, then some relative, if there be one, and his residence is known, shall be notified of the рroceedings; and in any case the judge shall appoint some suitable person or association to act in behalf of the child."
[4] We held in State ex rel. Raddue v. Superior Court,
[5] The relatоrs also complain that they were given no notice of the proposed appointment. If this was error, it was harmless. Their objections were argued fully on the hearing of their motion to quash the appointment, and as we have said, these objections were without merit.
[6-8] It is next contended that the court exceeded its authority when it appointed cоunsel to represent the petitioner, a probation officer. Probation officers are county officers (State ex rel. Richardson v. Clark County,
[9, 10] While it is the express duty of the probation officer to represent the interests of the child, this duty is exercised on behalf of the state and county in the pursuit of their common concern for the welfare of the child. In Bates v. School Dist. No. 10,
"In this stаte the prosecuting attorney is also the county attorney, and the relations of that officer to the county may be such as possibly require him to appear in behalf of the county in some instances, even if the specific duty may not be particularly and expressly prescribed by statute. If so, *202 the duty arises out of the obligations he has assumed as an offiсer of the county to discharge the general functions of an attorney in his [its] behalf."
[11] When in a juvenile court proceeding (which is not intended by the legislature to be adversary in nature) errors of law are urged and the jurisdiction of the court assailed, the probation officer, untrained in and unacquainted with such technical questions, cannot be expected to aid the court in their solution. Nevertheless, the court must dispose of these questions. If the relators are correct in their contention that the court is not to be assisted by the prosecuting attorney and has no inherent power to appoint an attorney in such circumstances, it must resolve them without the assistance of counsel, since the juvenile court act makes no provision for the employment of legal counsel for the court. The effective and orderly conduct of juvenile hearings is a matter with which the state and county are both deeply concerned. The letter and spirit of the statute prescribing the duties of the prosecuting attorney are broad enough to include the duty to assist the court in a juvenile court proceeding when his services are needed.
[12] When the prosecutor declined to appear, the court was authorized to appoint a special prosecutor, under RCW 36.27.030, which provides for the appointment of such a prosecutor when the prosecutor fails, from sickness or other cause, to attend court. The relators insist that this appointment increased their burden. Of course, where only one party is represented by counsel, the burden upon that party is lighter than it is where all parties are represented. However desirable the right to be free of opposing counsel may be, the law does not espouse such a right, for obvious reasons.
[13] Relators assign error to the court's refusal to strike the amended petition. They do not point out wherein the petition was defective, except that it failed to state "facts." While the petition is not drawn with the particularity of an indictment, it was definite enough to apprise the court and the relators of the conduct which led the petitioner to believе that an inquiry into the child's welfare was justified, *203 and it is not contended that the relators were misled. We find no merit in this assignment of error.
[14] There is also some contention that there is no evidence to support the findings of fact. While some of the testimony regarding the boy's past conduct was vague, and some of the witnesses were contradicted on details by other witnesses, we observe that the trial court made no findings on the unsubstantiated evidence. Those findings which were made are amply supported, and the court was justified in concluding that the welfare of the boy required that some action be taken.
[15] The program approved by the court involved a minimum of interference by the court and the social agency. When the parents indicated their unwillingness to co-operate, the court was left with no choice but to place the boy in an environment where his needs would be recognized and a genuine effort would be made to correct his difficulties. While the order of the trial court is affirmed, the jurisdiction of the court will continue. The court is free, of course, to modify its order if the co-operation of the parents warrants such action.
The order is affirmed.
HILL, C.J., DONWORTH, OTT, and FOSTER, JJ., concur.
January 30, 1958. Petition for rehearing denied.
NOTES
Notes
[1] Reported in