Free transcripts in custody appeals
Ju v. Bright
In brief
- Where it stands
- Dismissed
Petition denied.
- What it’s about
- Mao Ju asked the Supreme Court to review her claims that she could not afford the hearing transcript needed to appeal a custody ruling and that parental safeguards should depend on the effect of state orders, not the proceeding’s label.
- Who it affects
- The denial ended Ju’s Supreme Court case without a decision on her claims about the appeal transcript or protections for her parent-child relationship.
Summary: written with AI from the case record.
What it's about
She said those orders kept her from custody for eight years without a finding that she was unfit; the Court refused to hear her case (denied review) and did not decide her claims.
Ju said state custody orders kept her from custody for eight years without a finding that she was unfit.
Ju’s appeal dispute centered on whether she could get the hearing record needed to challenge a state custody ruling.
Question presented
1. Whether a State that prices the transcript of the dispositive hearing beyond an indigent parent ’ s reach, orders her English testimony excluded from any transcript, denies the statutory substitute on the ground that a transcript is “ available, ” and then affirms the judgment for want of a record violates the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment under Griffin v. Illinois, Boddie v. Connecticut, and M.L.B. v. S.L.J. 2. Whether the constitutional safeguards this Court has recognized for the parent-child relationship depend on the substance of a deprivation of parental rights or on the label the State attaches to the proceeding, where state custody orders have deprived a parent of custody continuously for eight years without any finding of parental unfitness?
Documents
Docket activity
New analysis added
AI analysis generated: Case Briefing
AI analysis generated: Decision Record
Case data updated: summary, question_presented, generation_metadata
Case data updated: question_presented, extraction_metadata
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Brief added: Petition
Sources
Primary materials plus reporting. Best-effort analysis: this explainer relies on a mix of primary materials and trusted secondary sources. Official filings and opinions remain authoritative.