People v. Mario C.People v. Mario C.
Opinion
Mario C. brings this appeal from an order of the juvenile court deferring entry of judgment under Welfare and Institutions Code section 790 et seq. He contends that the court erred by denying his motion to suppress evidence of a knife discovered on his person by a school administrator. We have concluded that there is no appealable order on which to base the appeal, and insufficient basis on which to predicate review by extraordinary writ. Accordingly, we will dismiss the appeal.
The district attorney filed a petition alleging that the minor, then 14 years of age, was a person described in section 602 of the Welfare and Institutions Code in that he possessed a knife with a locking blade on school property in violation of Penal Code sections 626.10 (count I), 12020, subdivision (a) (count II), and 653k (cоunt III).
The minor’s counsel filed a motion to suppress evidence of the offending knife. A police report indicated that the knife was discovered when a vice-principal at the minor’s school, while investigating a report of marijuana smoke emanating from a boy’s restroom, detained the minor along with two others, and instructed him to empty his pockets. The trial court denied the motion to suрpress. The minor thereupon admitted the allegations of the first two counts of the petition, and the third count was dismissed. The court then entered an order granting “DEJ,” which manifestly refers to deferred entry of judgment pursuant to Welfare and Institutions Code section 790 et seq. The court imposed a number of probation conditions, to remain in effect until March 2005.
DISCUSSION
At our request, the parties have briefed the questiоn whether an appeal will lie from an order granting deferred entry of judgment under Welfare and Institutions Code sections 790 et seq. We raised this question on our own motion because a reviewing court is “without jurisdiction to consider an appeal from a nonappealable order, and has the duty to dismiss such an appeal upon its own motion. [Citations.]”
(Adohr Milk Farms, Inc. v. Love
(1967)
The fundamental rule governing the appealability of orders is that “ ‘a judgment or order is not appealable unless expressly made so by statute.’ [Citations.]”
(People v. Mazurette
(2001)
Appeals by the minor subject of a juvenile wardship proceeding are governed by Welfare and Institutions Code section 800, subdivision (a), which authorizes appeal from “[a] judgment in a proceeding under Section 601 or 602 . . . , and any subsequent order . . . .” The question, therefore, is whether an order granting deferred entry of judgment is, for рurposes of this statute, a “judgment” or order after judgment.
In general, a “judgment” is “the final determination of the rights of the parties in an action or proceeding.” (
The order before us is not a judgment in either the general or the sрecific sense. As its very name indicates, the order does not enter judgment but “defer[s]” such entry indefinitely, perhaps permanently. The statutes creating this procedure are not a model of clarity, but their central purpose and effect is plain enough. They empower the court, under specified conditions, and upon the minor’s admission of the allegations of the petition, to place the minor on probation without adjudging him or her to be a ward of the court. (
These provisions confirm that far from constituting an adjudication of the issues raised by the petition, the order of deferral abates the adjudicatory process in the hope that the minor will comply with the probationary conditions and thereby avoid a judgment altogether. If that occurs, the record of the proceeding will be sealed for all purposes, with one narrow exception (discussed below). If the minor fails to satisfactorily comply, the court will enter judgment and make a dispositional order. In the latter instance, of course, a “judgment” will exist from which an appeal will lie. At the present juncture, however, there simply is no judgment from which to appeаl.
The minor contends that because his appeal challenges a ruling on a
suppression motion,
a right to appeal is granted by the proviso in Welfare and Institutions Code section 800, subdivision (a), that “[a] ruling on a motion to
suppress . . . shall be reviewed on appeal even if the judgment is predicated upon an admission of the allegations of the petition.” This language, however, does not purport to еnlarge the class of appealable judgments; rather it presupposes a challenge to the order “on appeal” from a “judgment.” Its literal and apparent effect is only to preserve the minor’s objection to an order denying a suppression motion where appellate
Given the absence of statutory authorization for appeal from an order dеferring judgment, we lack jurisdiction to entertain the present appeal. This conclusion finds support in
Mazurette, supra,
The minor attempts to distinguish
Mazurette
on thе ground that, in contrast to the parallel provisions of the Penal Code, the governing statute here uses the term “probation” in referring to the minor’s status while under an order deferring entry of judgment. (
The minor also attempts to distinguish
Mazurette
on the ground that it “arguably” rested on the cоurt’s supposed finding of an “available remedy” other than appeal in the form of “an extraordinary writ of mandate or prohibition.” He asserts that such a remedy is not available to the minor in a wardship proceeding, according to the holding in
Abdullah B. v. Superior Court
(1982)
The holding in
Mazurette
did not rest on any conclusion, and indeed the court did not conclude, that the defendant there could have obtained review of the suppression ruling by writ after being placed into the diversion program. Instead the court observed that dismissal of the appeal for want of jurisdiction “d[id] not leave criminal defendants in like position without any remedies.”
(Mazurette, supra,
There is no doubt that two of the three appellate remedies identified in
Mazurette
are (or were) equally available to the minor: He could have declined deferred entry of judgment and either admitted the allegations of the petition or disputed them at a jurisdictional hearing and, in either event, could have appealed from any ensuing adverse judgment. Further, he may yet appeal from any judgment that may enter should he fail to successfully complete probation. (See
For many reasons, we do not find in this remedial discrepancy a sufficient basis to hold the order here appealable. First, the holding in Mazurette simply cannot be said to depend on the statutory provision for pretrial writ review of suppression rulings, or indeed on the availability of any alternative remedy. The central syllogism on which the hоlding rests is that (1) an order is appealable only if made so by statute, and (2) no statute made the order appealable. That rationale is unaffected by the availability of other remedies. 2 The discussion of that subject seems designed to allay concerns that dismissal of the appeal produced harsh or unfair consequences. There is no indication that it was necessary to the decision.
Second, for present purposes the remedies available to the minor do not appear substantially less advantageous than those available to adult criminal defendants. In particular, the statutory right of a criminal defendant to seek pretrial writ review of an order denying a suppression motion possesses limited efficacy in the present context. Pretrial review is ordinarily available only if a motion to suppress is filed within 60 days after arraignment. (
Nor are we convinced that review by extraordinary writ is categorically foreclosed to one in the minor’s position. Neither Mazurette nor Abdullah considered the question whether one who has been subjected to deferred entry of judgment may then petition for a writ of mandate or prohibition on the ground that the order rests on an erroneous denial of a motion to suppress and that the conditions for extraordinary review are otherwise present. Our sеnse of the cases foreclosing such review in other contexts is that they rest on the implied exclusion of such a remedy under relevant statutory schemes. In the absence of such implied exclusion, we can think of no reason to believe that the traditional judicial power of review by extraordinary writ is categorically unavailable.
However, there is no need to finally decide this question here. The minor has not requested treatment of this appeal as a petition for extraordinary relief. Nor has he shown that the conditions for such relief are present.
An extraordinary writ will issue only when we “find that it is . . . ‘necessary to protect a substantial right and [then] only when it is shown that some substantial damage will be suffered by petitioner if said writ is denied.’ [Citation.]”
(People
v.
Superior Court (John D.)
(1979)
The minor suggests that the order deferring entry of judgment imposes a lingering potential harm because, in contrast to the defendant in
Mazurette,
his “slate” will not be “wiped” entirely “cleаn” upon successful completion of deferral; instead, prosecuting authorities will be entitled to consult the record in this matter “for the limited purpose of determining whether the minor is eligible for deferred entry of judgment pursuant to
We need not closely examine the effect of this provision because there is no indication
We emphasize that the point discussed in the previous three paragraphs assumes successful completion of the deferral program. Should the minor fail in that program, the statutes call for entry of a “judgment” from which he can then appeal, challеnging the denial of his suppression motion. (
Appellant also suggests that he has been subjected to probation conditions constituting “extreme limits on his freedom,” for which there is no recourse if he is denied appellate review. No attempt is made to substantiate this assertion with any indication (let alone a sworn statement) of how the minor is actually injured by the conditions. We acknowledge that some of the conditions, such the imposition of a “curfew,” do indeed work at least an abstract limitation on the minor’s personal liberty. As noted above, however, it appears likely that a reversal would also have certain adverse consequences for the minor by comparison to the successful completion of deferral. So far as this record shows, such completion—with its virtual expungement of the record in this matter—is now a few months from achievement. On such a record we will not undertake extraordinary review without an explicit request that we do so and a showing sufficient to support that request.
DISPOSITION
The appeal is dismissed.
Premo, J., and Elia, J., concurred.
Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied March 23, 2005.
Notes
In a perplexing departure from the principles cited in the previous paragraph, the juvenile dеferral statutes use the term “judgment” to refer to an event preceding the disposition hearing. (
We recognize, of course, that in interpreting a procedural statute it is appropriate, and may be vital, to consider the overall scheme of which it is a part. The defendant in Mazurette, however, failed—as has the minor here—to identify any statute that is reasonably susceptible to a reading which grants a right to appeal from the order in question.
The statute presents an anomaly in its supposition that after the minor successfully completes a deferral program, the record may remain relevant to a future determination whether the minor is “eligible” for a further deferred entry of judgment. (