Locked up for life? Too cruel

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Editorial, Los Angeles Times

 

Seven years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that offenders younger than 18 couldn’t be sentenced to death, arguing that juveniles are generally less culpable than adults because they are less mature, more impulsive and more susceptible to peer pressure. By the same unassailable logic, the court should hold that sentencing young murderers to life without parole is cruel and unusual punishment.

Evan Miller and Kuntrell Jackson were both 14 when they committed their crimes. Miller and a 16-year-old friend beat a neighbor and set fire to his house in Alabama, leading to the neighbor’s death by smoke inhalation. Jackson and two friends tried to rob a video store in Arkansas, and a store clerk was shot to death. Even though he didn’t pull the trigger, Jackson was convicted of felony murder. Both young men were sentenced to life without parole, a sentence that can be imposed on 14-year-olds in 38 states, including California, and under federal law.

The court should use these cases to declare that no one younger than 18 should be sentenced to life in prison without parole. That would be consistent not only with its 2005 ruling outlawing the death penalty for juveniles but also with a 2010 decision that minors convicted of crimes other than murder couldn’t be sentenced to life without parole. In that ruling, JusticeAnthony M. Kennedy’s opinion noted that 18 is “the point where society draws the line for many purposes between childhood and adulthood.”

 

Read the entire editorial here.

A judge, a teenage killer and a mother who forgives

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By Maggie Mulvihill, New England Center for Investigative Reporting

 

As the nation’s highest court prepares to hear oral arguments today on the constitutionality of sending juvenile killers to life in prison with no chance for parole, an unlikely trio of Bostonians is hopeful the justices move quickly to abolish the sentence.

“I would give my life for Hassan and he would do the same for me,” said retired Massachusetts Juvenile Court Judge Mark E. Lawton, speaking about a teenage killer he sentenced more than 20 years ago – but has now become Lawton’s close friend.

“If he were the devil incarnate I wouldn’t have anything to do with him, but he is a great tool for goodness,” Lawton said last week, as he prepared to introduce Hassan Smith, now 40, to his juvenile law class at New England School of Law in Boston.

Smith, now a father of three who mentors troubled inner-city youth, believes firmly teenagers – like the one he once was – deserve a chance at redemption no matter how serious their mistakes.

It is that very question the high court is being asked to rule on in the appeals of two-14-year-old killers. Like Smith, who was 16 when he shot Jeffrey Booker in Boston, both inmates are black.

One of those defendants, Evan Miller, from Alabama, was 14 in 2003 when he and an older boy fatally beat a drunken neighbor to death in a trailer park, lit the victim’s home on fire and fled.

 

Read the entire article here.

Cruel and Unusual Punishment for 14-Year-Olds

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Editorial, The New York Times

 

The Supreme Court in 2005 justly banned the death penalty for minors convicted of murder. In 2010, it banned life without parole for youths convicted of crimes other than murder. In two cases argued before the court on Tuesday, the justices should take the next step and ban life without parole for youths convicted of murder.

In an Alabama case, Evan Miller, a 14-year-old, and a friend stole a collection of baseball cards and $300 from a neighbor. They attacked the man with a baseball bat, and killed him when they set fire to his home. In an Arkansas case, Kuntrell Jackson, also 14, tried to rob a video store with two friends. When the clerk said she was going to call the police, one of the other youths shot and killed her with a shotgun. Both Mr. Miller and Mr. Jackson received mandatory sentences of life without parole for murder.

Alabama and Arkansas asked the court to allow them to continue to impose a sentence of life without parole for a juvenile who has committed murder. But the Supreme Court has found that there are critical differences between adolescents and adults in maturity and susceptibility to peer pressure and other forces. Relying on that insight in its 2005 and 2010 cases, the court concluded both times “it would be misguided to equate the failings of a minor with those of an adult.” It would be as misguided to equate young adolescents with adults in cases of murder.

 

Read the entire editorial here.

Commentary: The Forgiven

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By Mary Johnson and O’shea Israel

 

As we each prepared to enter the visitation room of Minnesota’s Stillwater state prison for men in 2005, one from the visitor’s side, one from the inmate’s side, we were both nervous, and found ourselves full of caution. For each of us, the biggest question was: Is forgiveness possible between the mother of a murdered youth and the teenager who took his life?

That meeting was the beginning of a unique partnership. We have cried together, healed together, talked and listened together, and found that simple conversations can change lives. Together, we speak to churches, schools, prisons and conferences. Our message is that violence can be prevented and that it is possible to live with forgiveness, no matter what has happened to you.

We usually avoid the specific details of that night in February 1993, when Laramiun Byrd lost his life. It’s too painful for any mother to relive. A 16-year-old killed a 20-year-old at a party, and Mary lost her only child. To be a grieving parent is the worst human pain, and we are both aware that healing and moving forward will never completely erase that hurt.

 

Read the entire article here.

Is It Just Another Tuesday?

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By Sonja Sohn, Huffington Post

 

Today is a Tuesday. Most Tuesdays I, along with many other Americans, wake up and carry on with our day as we would on most any other day — stretching in bed, walking sleepily to the bathroom to shower and get dressed, having a quick bite of breakfast and on to what we may not consider to be a luxury, but is — going to school or work or tending the task list for the day. In essence, we are simply enjoying our freedom to live; to make choices and mistakes as we go about the business of doing what we need and want to do, actively creating our lives and our futures as we go along.

Today in Washington, D.C., however, something else far more important than our focus on our individual happiness and survival is occurring; something that indicates whether we, as a society, have matured and evolved enough to be fair and nurturing to our children; something that heavily impacts the spirit of democracy and justice, how it is executed in our country and how it shapes our hearts and minds and future moving forward. Today the Supreme Court hears the cases of two young men, Evan Miller and Kuntrell Jackson, who were sentenced to die in prison as 14-year-old children.

The United States is the only country in the world where children under the age of 18 are sentenced to die in prison. The Court will decide in these cases whether life-without-parole sentences for children violate the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution, which prohibits “cruel and unusual” punishment. In a 54-year-old Supreme Court case, {(Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86, 100-01 (1958)] the court determined that “evolving standards of decency mark the progress of a maturing society” and should be used when determining cruel and unusual punishment. This often cited precedent has been used by the courts to define “standards of decency” at home and abroad.

 

Read the entire article here.

Teens change, given a chance

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By Edwin Desamour, The Philadelphia Inquirer

 

I pick up a call on the hotline. It’s one of several services the organization I cofounded provides for at-risk youths in my Philadelphia neighborhood. The kid on the other end of the of the line sounds scared. He’s trying to be macho, projecting anger, but he’s coming across as unsure. Most of all, he sounds young.

“I’m thinking about doing something,” he says. “These guys at school, they keep on jumping me. I may have to deal with it. I may have to bring my gun tomorrow.”

“OK,” I say. “Let’s think this through. You bring the gun to school. Let’s talk about the rest of your day. What happens? Do you go to school and everything is the same? Do you ride the bus home later? Are you sitting on the couch with your little brother in the late afternoon, watching cartoons, eating cereal, joking?

 

Read the entire article here.

Too young for life without parole

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By Katherine Ellison, Los Angeles Times

In 1646, the General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony passed the Stubborn Child Law, decreeing that teenage boys who disobeyed their parents could be put to death.

What a difference 3 1/2 centuries make. In our enlightened age, mothers and fathers study manuals for techniques to make children more compliant. And many of us are well acquainted with the critical mass of neuroscience establishing that adolescence constitutes a time of diminished responsibility, when the brain’s frontal lobes — the seat of judgment and impulse control — are still developing.

All too many U.S. criminal courts and state legislatures, however, have yet to get this memo.

Today, according to Human Rights Watch, 2,570 U.S. prisoners convicted of major crimes committed when they were 14 to 17 years old are serving sentences of life without parole. (Some 300 of them are in California.) In recent years, as other industrialized nations have adhered to international human rights conventions, the United States has become the world’s only nation to impose such sentences for minors, say researchers at the University of San Francisco School of Law.

 

Read the entire op-ed here.

Giving jailed juveniles a second chance at life

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By Marian Write Edleman, Opinions, The Washington Post

 

Edwin Desamour was driving with his 3-year-old son in their Philadelphia neighborhood recently when the little boy looked up and said, “Daddy, look at the moon! I want to go there!” So this father did what many parents would: He bought his son books on science and space voyages and encouraged him to believe that his dreams can come true.

Edwin’s son has been blessed with a vastly different childhood than Edwin had. Edwin grew up poor in a violent neighborhood in Philadelphia, surrounded by drugs, guns and crime. At age 16 he was convicted of a homicide. The time he spent with his father as a teenager came when they were assigned to the same cellblock in prison.

Edwin was caught up in dangerous surroundings he didn’t choose, and his violent actions as an adolescent resulted in terrible loss. But he matured in prison and became determined to earn parole so he could return to his old neighborhood and make a difference in the lives of other young men. In 2007 Edwin founded Men in Motion in the Community, an organization that provides positive role models for at-risk youths. It teaches them that there are consequences to their actions, and it helps youths avoid violence.

 

Read Marian’s opinion piece here.

Selected coverage of the oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court in Jackson v. Hobbs and Miller v. Alabama

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Media outlets throughout the United States and internationally have included stories and opinion pieces about the oral arguments and about sentences of life without parole for juveniles more generally. The coverage has been balanced and editorials in the major newspapers have called on justices to outlaw the practice. A sampling of the coverage follows.

 

The New York Times calls for a ban on sentences of life without parole for juveniles:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/opinion/cruel-and-unusual-punishment-for-14-year-olds.html

 

“You’re dealing with a 14-year-old being sentenced to life in prison, so he will die in prison without any hope. I mean, essentially, you’re making a 14-year-old throwaway person.”
— U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/us/supreme-court-revisits-issue-of-sentences-for-juveniles.html

 

The Washington Post writes, “A majority of the Supreme Court on Tuesday seemed troubled by imposing mandatory life sentences on juveniles convicted of murder but struggled to balance proper punishment for young killers with the chance for redemption.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/justices-debate-whether-young-killers-can-get-life-sentences-without-parole/2012/03/19/gIQAAJWXQS_story.html

 

The Los Angeles Times also notes that justices seem to want to limit juvenile life without parole sentences.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-court-juveniles-20120321,0,210566.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+latimes%2Fnews%2Fnationworld%2Fnation+(L.A.+Times+-+National+News)

 

SCOTUSblog offers initial analysis of the arguments:

http://www.scotusblog.com/2012/03/argument-recap-compromise-on-youth-sentences/#more-141094

 

Attorney Bryan Stevenson, who argued before the Supreme Court against life sentences without parole for youth, participated in a panel discussion on PBS’s News Hour:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/law/jan-june12/scotus_03-20.html

 

“We must stand up and be heard, demand that we, as a nation, develop a culture of understanding and compassion for all, especially our youth, many of whom grow up in poverty and dysfunction without the support of a healthy, stable family and effective, nurturing educational system. ”

–Activist and community activist Sonja Sohn in a Huffington Post article

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sonja-sohn/supreme-court-life-without-parole_b_1366522.html

 

A mother and the man, who as a 16-year-old son, share their story of forgiveness, redemption and grace:

http://www.bet.com/news/national/2012/03/20/commentary-the-forgiven.html

Juvenile Justice Week of Faith and Healing

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The 2012 Juvenile Justice Week of Faith and Healing (JJWFH) is March 5th – 11th. The week was started two years ago by the Healing and Justice Coalition in California and has been successful in raising awareness on juvenile justice issues. The JJWFH serves as an opportunity for us to reach out to faith communities and begin the conversation on life without parole for youth. More importantly, engaging faith communities is a way in which you can help to advance our mission and educate your community.

In addition, do not feel constricted to only the first full week in March–engaging faith communities is a year-round goal! In fact, we have a number events and activities planned before, during, and after March 5th – 11th.

Not quite sure how to get started? Please take a look at our Faith Leader Engagement Toolkit and addendum: JJWFH Faith Leader Toolkit 2012 ; JJWFH Toolkit Addendum (2012). It will take you through a step-by-step process in how to effectively work with faith leaders and their communities.