Gingerich v. Indiana, 979 N.E.2d 694 (Ind. Ct. App. 2012)

The Court of Appeals of Indiana found the juvenile court abused its discretion when it denied a 12-year-old’s continuance of his waiver hearing after his attorney only had four business days to investigate and prepare for the hearing.

The court reversed the child’s conviction in adult court and remanded the proceeding to juvenile court offering the following language in support:

“[T]he Indiana Supreme Court in Vance held that juvenile waiver hearings are not “perfunctory proceedings” and that due process requires that [youth] at waiver proceedings be afforded sufficient time to prepare a defense addressing both evidence of criminality as well as whether waiver would not be in the best interests of the child and the safety and welfare of the community. Under these circumstances, in which Gingerich’s counsel had four business days to prepare, and he repeatedly moved for a continuance both on April 27, 2010 and at the outset of the hearing itself, we conclude that Gingerich’s counsel did not have sufficient time to prepare and that he was prejudiced.”