Rule 3.906.Use of Restraints on a Juvenile

MCR 3.906 starts from a prohibition rather than a grant of discretion. Instruments of restraint such as handcuffs, chains, irons, straitjackets, cloth and leather restraints, and similar items may not be used on a juvenile during a court proceeding. Restraints become available only if the court makes a finding, and the rule names the only findings that will do.

The three grounds

Subrule (A) lists the factors, any one of which supports an order:

• Restraints are necessary to prevent physical harm to the juvenile or another person.
• The juvenile has a history of disruptive courtroom behavior that has placed others in potentially harmful situations, or presents a substantial risk of inflicting physical harm on himself or herself or others as evidenced by recent behavior.
• There is a founded belief that the juvenile presents a substantial risk of flight from the courtroom.

Each ground is written to require something specific. The second reaches back to a history of behavior in a courtroom or to recent behavior as the evidence of present risk. The third asks for a founded belief, not an impression. All three are written as findings about the juvenile before the court.

Procedure before the order

Subrule (B) sequences the decision. The court's determination that restraints are necessary must be made before the juvenile is brought into the courtroom and appears before the court, so the question is settled outside the juvenile's presence rather than resolved after the juvenile is already restrained in front of the bench.

The court shall provide the juvenile's attorney an opportunity to be heard before ordering restraints. If restraints are ordered, the court shall state on the record or in writing its findings of fact in support of the order. That record requirement is what makes the three grounds reviewable, since a bare conclusion that restraints were necessary would not show which factor the court relied on or what supported it.

How restraints may be applied

Subrule (C) limits the form of the restraint even when one is properly ordered. Any restraints used in the courtroom must allow the juvenile limited movement of the hands to read and handle documents and writings necessary to the hearing, which protects the juvenile's ability to participate in the proceeding rather than only watch it. The subrule then closes one option entirely: under no circumstances should a juvenile be restrained using fixed restraints to a wall, floor, or furniture.