State Ex Rel. State Public Defender v. Percy

The secretary of the Department of Health and Social Services has appealed from the order of the circuit court. The order requires him to apply the Children’s Code, ch. 48, Stats. 1977, to all children in the department’s custody, including those whose custody was acquired under ch. 48 before the effective date of its amendment, November 17,1978. The amendment was effected by ch. 354, Laws of 1977. We refer to the Children’s Code as it existed immediately before and after November 17, 1978 as the “old” and “new” code, respectively.

The old code required the juvenile court to order one of…