Argued that the PA Juvenile Act authorizes child welfare courts to retain jurisdiction over foster children aged 18 to 21 and to order agencies to continue to serve those youth in a course of treatment or instruction.
Argued that imposing strict liability on a 12-year-old violates the US and Ohio Constitutions' guarantees of fundamental fairness, provides for highly disproportionate penalties and collateral consequences and creates a risk of prosecution based on personal views or biases.
Challenged the zero-tolerance approach to student misbehavior where a teen was sentenced to 100 days in juvenile detention for distributing a poem that mentioned bringing guns to school.
Juvenile Law Center argued that juvenile court should retain discretion to spare children from permanent stigma associated with lifetime sex offender registration.
Challenged the zero-tolerance approach in the delinquency adjudication of an eighth-grade student whose creative writing assignment invoked an unhappy student who cut off his teacher’s head when she told him to shut up.
Argued that prosecuting a minor under a strict liability statute and shifting the burden to the minor to prove consent without the opportunity to confront his accuser at the subsequent ‘consent’ hearing under the Michigan Sex Offenders Registration Act violates the minor’s due process rights.
Argued that a sentence of 110 years to life (three consecutive life-terms) for a non-homicide offense committed as a juvenile violates the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Graham v. Florida.
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