In re Michael S.
- Reporters:
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- Before:
- Sullivan
Opinion
SULLIVAN, C. J.The dispositive issue in this appeal is whether an order transferring jurisdiction from the juvenile matters division of the trial court to the regular criminal docket of the Superior Court is an appealable final judgment. We conclude that it is not. Accordingly, we dismiss the appeal.
The record reveals the following relevant facts and procedural history. On January 19, 2000, the respondent, Michael S., was arrested and charged with the October 30,1975 murder of Martha Moxley. The respondent, who was thirty-nine years old at the time of his arrest, had been fifteen years old at the time of the alleged murder. Because the respondent had been a juvenile at the time of the alleged murder, he was charged as a delinquent in the juvenile matters division of the trial court.
Pursuant to
On June 20, 21 and 28, 2000, the juvenile matters division held a probable cause hearing limited to the issues of establishing the respondent’s age and whether there was probable cause to believe that he had committed the murder. On August 17, 2000, the court issued its decision, concluding that there was probable cause. It also ordered an investigation by the probation office pursuant to
The respondent thereafter appealed from the order of the juvenile matters division of the trial court to the Appellate Court. The state moved to dismiss the appeal for lack of a final judgment. The Appellate Court denied that motion without prejudice and ordered the parties to address in their briefs whether the transfer order of the juvenile division of the trial court was a final judgment. Thereafter, we granted the parties’ joint motion to transfer the case to this court.
The respondent claims on appeal that: (1) pursuant to Public Acts 1986, No. 86-185, § 2 (P.A. 86-185),3 he
It is well established that “[t]he right of appeal exists only by virtue of statutory authority. In re Judicial Inquiry No. 85-01, 221 Conn. 625, 633, 605 A.2d 545 (1992), citing State v. Audet, 170 Conn. 337, 342, 365 A.2d 1082 (1976). Generally, appellate courts in this state do not have jurisdiction to entertain appeals not taken from final judgments. See
The appeal provisions for juvenile proceedings are set forth at
In In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), 195 Conn. 303, 488 A.2d 778 (1985), this court considered whether an order of the juvenile matters division transferring the case to the regular criminal docket pursuant to
In the year following this court’s decision in In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), supra, 195 Conn. 303, the
The respondent argues that P.A. 86-185, § 2, was enacted in response to this court’s decision in In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), supra, 195 Conn. 303, and was intended to clarify the original intent of
“In determining the effect of a subsequent statutory amendment on earlier legislation, we are guided by well defined principles of statutory interpretation. We recognize the usual presumption that, in enacting a statute, the legislature intended a change in existing law. . . . This presumption, however, like any other, may be rebutted by contrary evidence of the legislative intent in the particular case. . . . In determining the
We agree with the respondent that P.A. 86-185, § 2, was enacted in response to our decision in In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), supra, 195 Conn. 303. In a hearing on the proposed legislation before the judiciary committee, Raphael Podolsky of the Center for Advocacy and Research testified that the legislation addressed a “problem [that] arises from a recent [S]upreme [C]ourt case in 1985 that says you can’t take an appeal if the [S]uperior [C]ourt . . . moves a child . . . from the juvenile docket to the regular docket.” Conn. Joint Standing Committee Hearings, Judiciary, Pt. 3, 1986 Sess., pp. 826-27. He further testified that “the reason that [the transfer order] needs to be appealable earlier is because what you lose is . . . the confidentiality of the juvenile court system and you lose the right to have children segregated from adults. So that if you can’t take the appeal at that point, that appeal will forever be lost. It was a 3 to 2 decision of the [S]upreme [C]ourt interpreting the existing statute. This Bill, in effect, adopts the opinion of the two rather than the opinion of the three.” Id., p. 827, remarks of Podolsky. “It is now well settled that testimony before legislative committees may be considered in determining the particular problem or issue that the legislature sought to address by the legislation. . . . This is because legislation is a puiposive act . . . and, therefore, identifying the particular problem that the legislature sought to resolve
The fact that P.A. 86-185, § 2, was intended to overrule In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), supra, 195 Conn. 303, however, “is insufficient to overcome the presumption against retroactive applicability; indeed, it sheds little, if any, light on whether the legislature intended for the amendment to be applied retroactively. The mere fact that the legislature changes the language of a statutory provision in response to a judicial decision interpreting that provision does not mean that the legislature necessarily intended that the amendatory language be retroactive.” Colonial Penn Ins. Co. v. Bryant, 245 Conn. 710, 720, 714 A.2d 1209 (1998). In the cases wherein this court has held that a statutory amendment had been intended to be clarifying and, therefore, should be applied retroactively, the pertinent legislative history has provided “uncontroverted support . . . for the conclusion that the legislature considered the amendatory language to be a declar ation of the legislature’s original intent rather than a change in the existing statute.” (Citation omitted; emphasis in original; internal quotation marks omitted.) Id., 721. The legislative history of P.A. 86-185, § 2, contains no indication that the legislature enacted that provision to clarify, rather than to change, the existing law.10
Finally, we note that the underlying substantive purposes of P.A. 86-185, § 2, were to protect the privacy of juveniles and to ensure that they were not incarcerated with adults during pretrial and trial proceedings. As the state points out, the only effect of retroactive application of the amendment would be to allow persons who, like the respondent, are charged with committing murder as juveniles before 1986 to appeal directly from transfer orders. None of those persons is now a juvenile. Retroactive application of the amendment, therefore, would entail all of the “delays and disruptions attendant upon intermediate appeals”; (internal quotation marks omitted) In re Juvenile Appeal (85-AB), supra, 195 Conn. 309; without advancing the underlying purpose of the amendment.11
The appeal is dismissed.
In this opinion the other justices concurred.
Notes
Public Acts 1986, No. 86-185, § 2, amended
This statute has been amended several times since the date of the alleged murder in 1975. The retroactivity of the current version of the statute is not at issue in this appeal, and the parties have proceeded under that version.
Under Curdo, “[a]n otherwise interlocutory order is appealable in two circumstances: (1) where the order or action terminates a separate and distinct proceeding, or (2) where the order or action so concludes the rights of the parties that further proceedings cannot affect them.” State v. Curcio, supra, 191 Conn. 31.
The final judgment language continued to be included in
In support of his argument to the contrary, the respondent quotes our statement in Edelstein v. Dept. of Public Health & Addiction Services, supra, 240 Conn. 669, that “[i]f the amendment was enacted soon after controversies arose as to the interpretation of the original act, it is logical to regard the amendment as a legislative interpretation of the original act.” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) See id., citing Reliance Ins. Co. v. American Casualty Co. of Reading, Pennsylvania, 238 Conn. 285, 290, 679 A.2d 925 (1996), State v. Blasko, 202 Conn. 541, 558, 522 A.2d 753 (1987), and 1A J. Sutherland, Statutory Construction (5th Ed. Singer 1992) § 22.31, p. 279. In Edelstein and the cases cited therein, however, the legislative history of the amendment under review provided independent support for this court’s conclusion that the amendment under review was intended to clarify, rather than to change, the law. To the extent that the language cited by the respondent suggests that the fact that an amendment occurred soon after a court’s interpretation of the original act is, in itself, sufficient to show that the amendment was intended to be clarifying legislation, that suggestion was explicitly rejected in Colonial Penn Ins. Co. v. Bryant, supra, 245 Conn. 720, wherein we concluded that that fact was insufficient to overcome the presumption against retroactive application.
We note that the problem presented by aging juveniles was recognized by. the legislature when it enacted Spec. Sess. P.A. 94-2, § 6, deleting the final judgment language from