Mercer

Appeal from a judgment declaring appellant H.L.R., a minor, to be a ward of the juvenile court under Welfare and Institutions Code section 602. The judgment rests upon a finding that H.L.R. was in possession of marijuana in violation of Health and Safety Code section 11530.

*613 The basic contention of H.L.B. is that an extrajudicial confession of possession of marijuana was introduced into evidence notwithstanding the absence of any intelligent waiver of the right to counsel at the time the statement was given. A secondary contention is that testimony by others necessary to establish the corpus delicti was the product of the unlawfully obtained confession. Both contentions are sound.

The minor, H.L.B., then 16 years of age, was under the legal custody of his mother, a resident of Sacramento, but when the events with which we are concerned occurred he was residing with his father and stepmother at South Lake Tahoe where he attended high school. His mother also had remarried. Early on a Sunday morning (approximately 5 a.m.) he was taken in to the sheriff’s office for a curfew violation. He was released to, and taken by, his father to the latter’s home. The father noticed the…