In re Appeal No. 179

The appellant, age 15, was adjudged to be a juvenile delinquent. The finding resulted from his participation in three housebreakings and malicious destruction of properties which occurred during the afternoon hours. Appellant readily admitted his culpability. He said that the reason he and two other juveniles broke into the three residences was that they were hungry. One hundred twenty-two dollars was stolen from one house, and in the other two homes the destruction committed by the juveniles took the form of slashed portraits, torn pictures, a mutilated diary and splattered eggs in and about the house.1 Appellant did not explain, nor was he asked, how the mutilation and the hurling of eggs throughout the houses sated his hunger. Approximately one and one-half months following the adjudicatory hearing, Md. Rule 912, a disposition hearing was held, Md. Rule 913. At that time the court possessed a report of a clinical psychologist. Testimony was taken from the school principal in which it was indicated that the appellant, sometime after the adjudicatory hearing, had been suspended from school because a fire had occurred in his locker. Although the appellant denied that he set fire to his own locker, the principal was of the impression that the juvenile had done so. The principal stated that the young man was a ""B - C student who could be A"", and that ""the youngster has the potential to do even better"". The psychologist's report, after indicating most strongly that there was a conflict between the juvenile and his father which emotionally ""terrorized"" the juvenile, stated: