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 the court should recognize a youth’s constitutional right to a jury trial when he faces public sex offender registration upon conviction of sex offenses under Kansas’ juvenile court statute.
Argued that the highly intrusive search of a fifteen-year old public alternative school student, which occurred on school grounds, was unconstitutional, violating her right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures.
These briefs involved a thirteen-year-old student who was questioned by four adults, including a uniformed police officer, on school grounds regarding a series of break-ins. Juvenile Law Center argued that the student should have been considered in custody for Miranda purposes.
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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