Justices: Juvenile courts lack jurisdiction over dangerous possession of firearm law

Juvenile courts lack jurisdiction to adjudicate the offense of dangerous possession of a firearm because an adult cannot be charged with that crime, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Tuesday. The decision vacating a delinquency adjudication casts doubt on the state law that bars possession of guns by minors.

The state’s high court overturned a delinquency adjudication under the dangerous possession of a firearm statute in K.C.G. v. State of Indiana, 20S-JV-263.

K.C.G. was adjudicated delinquent in Marion Superior Court after he was accused of stealing and crashing a car then fleeing from the scene. Police also found marijuana on the 16-year-old when they found him, and he was placed on probation after he agreed to admit to two delinquent acts.

While on probation, K.C.G. told others he had a gun and a bomb, and police and his probation officer found a rifle while searching his bedroom. The state filed a delinquency petition alleging dangerous possession of a firearm, Ind. Code § 35-47-10-5, and the court adjudicated K.C.G. a delinquent on that count, modifying his probation with a suspended commitment to the department of correction.

The Indiana Court of Appeals previously affirmed the adjudication. In seeking to harmonize conflicting statutes, the COA panel looked to C.C. v. State, 907 N.E.2d 556 (Ind. Ct. App. 2009) and to Indiana Code section 31-30-1-1(14), which gave juvenile courts jurisdiction over “other proceedings specified by law.”

“But we decline to embrace that approach,” Justice Geoffrey Slaughter wrote for the unanimous Indiana Supreme Court. “Rather than crediting the asserted intent behind the criminal statute, I.C. § 35-47-10-5, we give dispositive weight to the plain language of the jurisdictional statute, id. § 31-30-1-1. … (T)he jurisdictional statute establishes that the State must allege the child committed an ‘act that would be an offense if committed by an adult’. Id. § 31-37-1-2. Even if the State were correct about legislative intent, we decline to ignore the clear jurisdictional mandate of Section 31-30-1-1 based on an inference from an entirely separate statute.

“… When the legislature is imprecise, the State does not get the benefit of the doubt,” the court held.

“(T)he dangerous-possession statute defines the offense in terms of a ‘child’ who ‘knowingly, intentionally, or recklessly possesses a firearm for any purpose other than a purpose described in [IC 35-47-10-1],’” which permits possession for hunting, target shooting and other activities as well as possession with parental consent. “… This provision is clear and applies only to children; adults cannot commit dangerous possession of a firearm. Thus, K.C.G.’s alleged possession of a firearm could never be an offense committed by an adult, and the State’s nominal allegation that K.C.G. is a ‘delinquent child’ because he committed a ‘delinquent act’ failed as a matter of law, meaning the juvenile court lacked jurisdiction.”

The state high court also rejected the state’s argument that vacating K.C.G.’s adjudication would produce an absurd result. “We could not ‘fix’ the alleged absurdity here merely by changing or supplying a word or phrase. Any judicial fix would require that we expand the statute’s potential class of offenders to include adults with unauthorized firearms. Yet this proposed revision would implicate not only separation of powers by rewriting the legislature’s narrow enactment but also perhaps the Second Amendment by treating even protected firearms as potentially off limits to adults, see McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010); District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008). Moreover, applying the doctrine here would be qualitatively different from our other applications of it. … Thus, we reject the absurdity doctrine on this record and interpret the dangerous-possession statute not to apply to adults.”