United States v. Juvenile

347 F.3d 778, 2003 Daily Journal DAR 11642, 2003 U.S. App. LEXIS 21651, 2003 WL 22410829
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
DecidedOctober 23, 2003
Docket02-30253
StatusPublished
Cited by55 cases

This text of 347 F.3d 778 (United States v. Juvenile) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Juvenile, 347 F.3d 778, 2003 Daily Journal DAR 11642, 2003 U.S. App. LEXIS 21651, 2003 WL 22410829 (9th Cir. 2003).

Opinions

Opinion by Judge FERGUSON; Concurrence by Judge LAY; Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge GOULD.

FERGUSON, Circuit Judge:

C.K., a juvenile, appeals the sentence imposed by the District Court as a result of his guilty plea delinquency adjudication, under which C.K. will remain confined until his twenty-first birthday. The District Court had jurisdiction under the Federal Juvenile Delinquency Act (FJDA), 18 U.S.C. § 5031 et seq., and we have jurisdiction over his appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We hold that the sentence imposed was both arbitrary and in direct contravention of the rehabilitative purposes of the FJDA and therefore an abuse of discretion.

I. Background and Procedural History

A. Factual Background

C.K. is a fourteen-year old member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. He was born in Montana and spent the first six years of his life on the Fort Belknap Indian reservation with his parents and other family members. A precocious young person, C.K. attended Head Start and could read and count to 100 by the time he was three.

In 1994, when C.K. was around six, his parents separated. C.K. and his younger brother and sister officially remained in the custody of their mother, who moved to South Dakota. Although they lived with their mother, the three siblings returned to stay with their father and paternal grandmother in the Fort Belknap Indian community on a regular basis over the next two years. C.K. attended first grade in South Dakota, where he received excellent or outstanding grades.

Around the time of his parents’ separation, C.K. was referred to the Fort Belk-nap Health Center (“FBHC”) by the Fort Belknap Tribal Court. C.K’s parents had ongoing conflicts and both of them alleged that C.K. had been abused by the other. C.K.’s paternal grandmother also reported to FBHC workers that C.K. was “mean” when he returned from his mother’s residence in South Dakota. FBHC’s own report indicated that C.K. appeared to be [781]*781“nervous.” Concerned, the FBHC clinician requested that C.K be interviewed alone. However, C.K. denied that anyone had ever touched him sexually. Other than the initial interview, C.K. was not referred for further evaluation or counseling.

Tragically, C.K. was in fact being severely sexually abused by multiple offenders during the period both before and after this interview. When C.K. was between four and five years old, an older boy for whom C.K’s mother was babysitting abused C.K. repeatedly, sodomizing him approximately thirty to forty times and forcing him to perform oral sex approximately twenty times over a one-year period. Fearful of retaliation and only barely old enough to comprehend what was -happening to him, C.K. did not report the abuse to his parents or anyone else.

Unfortunately, C.K.’s victimization did not stop with this traumatic experience. A couple of years later, while staying with his mother in South Dakota, C.K. was again abused, this time by an older cousin. Over a period of many months, this cousin sodomized C.K. on at least forty or fifty occasions and forced him to engage in oral sex. He also exposed C.K. to pornographic material and, on at least one occasion, tied him up while he abused him. Although C.K’s little sister complained to their mother about their cousin’s behavior, apparently their mother did not seek treatment or counseling for either of the children, nor did she inform their father about what had occurred. No punishment was ever imposed on either of the individuals who victimized C.K., nor did he receive counseling or other support services as a result of these incidents.

When C.K. returned from South Dakota, his father noticed a marked change in his personality, including more physical inhibitions. As C.K’s father explained at the sentencing hearing,

I remember vividly when [C.K.] would come home [to Montana], and I would always call him Tweety Bird, because he had great big eyes. And he used to always tell me about his encounters. And I remember he used to come home, crawl over my shoulders like a little snake up and down my legs and jump on my lap ... And one summer he came home and he never did that. And he stayed away ... He was distant.... I thought that was because he was reaching adolescence at any early age ... because ... he talked about[ ] the birds and bees, because he had some questions about why hair was growing in certain places, if it was all right to grow there and stuff. But the day he stopped crawling all over me and telling me about his fun he had in South Dakota, makes sense now, because that’s when he was victimized.1

In 1996, C.K.’s father obtained physical custody over all three siblings through the Tribal Court.

As noted above, C.K. was an exceptional student and, for many years, did not have problems in school. His instructors at the Catholic school in Montana where he attended fifth and sixth grade reported that he was well-liked by teachers and other students, although he was somewhat quiet. As he entered middle school, however, C.K. began to have repeated attention and [782]*782discipline problems. C.K. later reported that he experienced recurring nightmares, insomnia, anger, intrusive thoughts, and depression during this time, all of which are associated with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), a frequent symptom of sexual abuse among children. See Kendall-Taekett et al., at 175.

In December 2000, when he was twelve, C.K. attempted suicide by intentionally ingesting a muscle relaxant. After his stomach was pumped, he reported to hospital officials that he was depressed because of his younger half-brother’s ongoing treatment for leukemia. He was released the following day and, again, no one referred C.K. for further evaluation or counseling.

Several months later, on April 26, 2001, C.K.’s school psychologist contacted Fort Belknap Social Services to report allegations that C.K. had sexually abused two children. The Federal Bureau of Investigations (“FBI”) subsequently took over the investigation. During the course of the investigation, it was revealed that C.K. had initiated sexual contact with a slightly younger girl by touching her vaginal area on one occasion. One of C.K.’s cousins also alleged that C.K. had placed his hand on his penis and buttocks while they were sitting on a couch, and that C.K. had sodomized him and forced him to engage in oral sex several years earlier (when C.K. was approximately eight or nine years old).2

Almost immediately upon hearing of the allegations about his son, C.K’s father requested that C.K. be evaluated by clinicians at FBHC. FBHC workers noted that C.K. “occasionally appeared disengaged from conversation[,] described himself as having an ability to distract himself from bad things” and was possibly subject to PTSD. C.K. also expressed to FBHC workers that he was “shocked and numb” as a result of the allegations, and denied that the alleged conduct had taken place.

A few weeks after his initial evaluation by FBHC, C.K. was examined by a doctor in Billings, Montana, who conducted a “psychosexual evaluation.”3 During this three and a half hour interview, C.K.

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Bluebook (online)
347 F.3d 778, 2003 Daily Journal DAR 11642, 2003 U.S. App. LEXIS 21651, 2003 WL 22410829, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-juvenile-ca9-2003.