Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

This appeal involved two criminal cases against Mario Harris. In Harris I, Harris pleaded guilty to two offenses with forfeiture specifications. After the trial court imposed a sentence, Harris filed a motion for resentencing, which the court denied. The appellate court held that the trial court's denial of Harris's motion was not a final, appealable order because the sentencing court had failed to include the terms of forfeiture in the judgment of conviction. In Harris II, Harris pled guilty to an offense with an automobile-forfeiture specification. The trial court imposed a prison sentence and ordered the forfeiture. The court denied Harris's subsequent motion for resentencing. The appellate court held that the sentence was void because the trial court had failed to include a mandatory driver's license suspension as part of Harris's sentence. The Supreme Court consdoliated the cases and held (1) a journal entry of conviction need not include a related forfeiture in order to be a final appealable order; and (2) when a trial court fails to impose a mandatory driver's license suspension as part of an offender's sentence, that part of the sentence is void, and resentencing is limited to the imposition of the statutorily mandated term.

Appellant, inmate Sidney Souffrance, petitioned the court of appeals for a writ of mandamus to compel Appellee, the records custodian for the Life Skills Center of Cincinnati, a community school, to provide access to the attendance records, addresses, and telephone numbers of all students who were in a certain classroom during two specific months and to records indicating which computer terminal a specific student had used during one of those months. The court of appeals held that the disclosure of the requested records was barred by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that although the record request related to persons who were no longer students, because the persons were students when the records were created and originally maintained, the records were subject to the nondisclosure provisions of FERPA.

County Commissioners passed a resolution establishing an early retirement incentive plan (ERIP). The resolution made the plan available to all employees of Commissioners except for the sanitary engineering division. A few days before passage of the resolution, some employees of the division filed a grievance regarding eligibility for the retirement plan. None of them were members of Union, a bargaining unit of employees who worked for the sanitary engineering division, but at least four Union members attended the hearing. The county administrator determined that the division employees were not permitted to participate in the retirement plan. Union filed a taxpayer action against Commissioners, on behalf of all union-member division employees, seeking a declaration that the ERIP was in violation of Ohio Rev. Code 145.297. The trial court agreed and held for Union. The court of appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) Union lacked standing to bring a taxpayer action against Commissioners, and to the extent that Union had standing in its own right, Union failed to exhaust its administrative remedies; and (2) therefore, the issue of whether Commissioners' ERIP was in violation of section 145.297 was moot.

Appellee Tracy Davis was indicted under Ohio Rev. Code 2921.04(B) for witness intimidation based on a threat he made to his ex-wife after police began investigating the underlying crime but before any charges had been filed. Section 2921.04(B) prohibits the intimidation of a person who observes a crime after the initiation of proceedings flowing from the criminal act in a court of justice. The trial court convicted Davis for witness intimidation. The court of appeals reversed, finding that no "action or proceeding" existed at the time of the threat, and therefore, the victim of the threat was not a witness under section 2921.04(B). The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the court of appeals correctly determined that insufficient evidence existed to convict Davis for witness intimidation based on his threat to his ex-wife because a police investigation of a crime, without more, is not a proceeding in a court of justice and does not invoke the protection of section 2921.04(B) for a person who observes the crime.

The trial court appointed a receiver for Sager Corporation for the purpose of accepting service of process and marshaling assets consisting of unexhausted liability-insurance policies for asbestos-related claims filed against Sager. Sager was an Illinois corporation that filed for dissolution in 1998 and, pursuant to Illinois law, was no longer amenable to suit after 2003. The appellate court affirmed. The Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the appellate court, holding that, in conformity with the constitutional requirements of due process and the Full Faith and Credit Clause, claims filed against the dissolved Illinois corporation more than five years after dissolution were barred, and therefore, the appointment of the receiver was barred.

C.P. was fifteen years old when he was charged with two counts of rape and one count of kidnapping with sexual motivation. The juvenile court found C.P. to be a delinquent child and designated him a serious youthful offender in relation to each offense. Further, the court classified C.P. a public-registry-qualified juvenile-offender registrant (PRQJOR) and a Tier III sex-offender/child-victim offender pursuant to Ohio Rev. Code 2152.86. At issue on appeal was the constitutionality of section 2152.86, which created the new class of juvenile sex-offender registrants, PRQJORs, who are automatically subject to mandatory, lifetime sex-offender registration and notification requirements without the participation of a juvenile judge. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that to the extent that it imposes such requirements on juvenile offenders tried with the juvenile system, section 2152.86 violates the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment and the due process clauses of the state and federal Constitutions.

Appellant Roland Nickleson filed a complaint for a writ of mandamus to compel Appellee, the county court of common pleas judge, to issue a final, appealable order in his criminal case. The court of appeals dismissed the complaint. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) notwithstanding Nickleson's claims, his sentencing entry was a final, appealable order because it contained a full resolution of all the counts of his indictment for which there were convictions; and (2) Nickleson had an adequate remedy by appeal from his sentencing entry to raise his other claims contesting the validity of the indictment, the propriety of the jury instructions, and the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his convictions.

Defendant pled guilty to aggravated murder and kidnapping. At his sentencing hearing, Defendant was notified of postrelease control, but the language indicating notification had been made was inadvertently omitted from the sentencing entry that resulted from that hearing. When the omission came to light, the trial court corrected the sentencing entry through a nunc pro tunc entry that stated that the notification had been made and denied Defendant's request for a new sentencing hearing. The appellate court upheld the trial court's actions as a permissible use of a nunc pro tunc entry. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the trial court's use of a nun pro tunc entry was appropriate in the specific circumstances of this case.

Gerald Strothers requested that East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton provide access to review, inspect, and copy at cost various public records. A week after Strothers's public-records request was received by Norton, Strothers filed a petition for a writ of mandamus to compel Norton to provide access to the requested records. Norton subsequently made available to Strothers all of the requested records. The court of appeals denied the writ of mandamus but awarded Strothers $1,000 in statutory damages. The Supreme Court affirmed the portion of the judgment denying the writ of mandamus and reversed the portion awarding statutory damages, holding that the court of appeals (1) correctly held that Norton's evidence established that Strothers had been given access to all of the requested records, which rendered his mandamus claim moot; and (2) abused its discretion in granting statutory damages to Strothers, as Norton produced the records within a reasonable period of time.

After receiving a dispatch that a male driving a tow truck was armed and planned to kill himself, two police officers stopped the driver, Richard Dunn. Because they were dealing with an allegedly suicidal person, they handcuffed Dunn and placed him in a police cruiser. The officers subsequently found a loaded gun in the truck's glove compartment. Dunn was indicted on one count of improper handling of a firearm in a motor vehicle. Dunn filed a motion to suppress, contending that the traffic stop violated the Fourth Amendment. The trial court overruled the motion, holding that the stop was a legitimate response to an emergency situation. Dunn then pleaded no contest to the charge. The court of appeals reversed and granted the motion to suppress. The Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals and reinstated the judgment of the trial court, holding that the officers in this case were authorized to stop Dunn because the community-caretaking/emergency-aid exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement allows a low-enforcement officer with objectively reasonable grounds to believe that there is an immediate need for her assistance to protect life or prevent serious injury to effect a community-caretaking/emergency-aid stop.