Supreme Court to consider juvenile ‘lifers’

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Does life without parole for minors who didn’t kill constitute cruel and unusual punishment?

By David G. Savage

September 28, 2009

Reporting from Washington –

Joe Sullivan was 13 years old when he and two older boys broke into a home, where they robbed and raped an elderly woman. After a one-day trial in 1989, Sullivan was sentenced to life in prison with no chance for parole.

Terrance Graham was 16 when he and two others robbed a restaurant. When he was arrested again a year later for a home break-in, a Florida judge said he was incorrigible. In 2005, Graham received a life term with no parole.

The two young convicts represent an American phenomenon, one the Supreme Court is set to reconsider in the fall term that opens Oct. 5. At issue is whether it is cruel and unusual punishment to imprison a minor until he or she dies when the crime does not involve murder.

According to Amnesty International, “The United States is the only country in the world that does not comply with the norm against imposing life-without-parole sentences on juveniles.”

Nearly all of the estimated 2,500 U.S. prisoners serving life terms for juvenile crimes, the group said, were guilty either of murder or of participating in a crime that led to a homicide. But 109 inmates are serving life sentences for other crimes committed when they were younger than 18.

Sullivan’s and Graham’s lawyers do not claim the young men deserve to go free.

“We are not asking for Mr. Graham to be released any time soon,” attorney Bryan Gowdy said. “We are asking the court to declare unconstitutional a sentence of life without parole for these crimes. It would be entirely different if Mr. Graham had a meaningful opportunity for parole.”

The question will be an early test of whether Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a former prosecutor, will align herself with the court’s tough-on-crime conservatives or join with its liberals to strike down prison policies perceived as going too far.

Sullivan’s and Graham’s cases will be heard in November. Many lawyers and prosecutors said that until the Supreme Court agreed this year to take up the issue, they were unaware of juveniles receiving such sentences.

Sullivan, now 33, has been in prison for 20 years. The Florida appeals court and the state Supreme Court refused to review his sentence. When his case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, Florida Atty. Gen. Bill McCollum said the appeal should be dismissed on the grounds that it was too late to raise the issue of cruel and unusual punishment.

A lawyer for Graham has called his client’s life sentence freakish and unfair. A second youth who participated in the restaurant robbery hit an employee with a club. He was later arrested for robbing a gas station and sentenced to three years in prison. He has since been released.

Florida leads the nation in sending teenagers to prison for life with no possible parole for crimes such as burglary, assault or rape. It has at least 77 such inmates. California and six other states also have at least one.

“This is a hidden group. They don’t get a lot of attention because there was no homicide,” said Paolo Annino, a law professor at Florida State University who has compiled national data on these prisoners.

California officials said they were unaware of having four such inmates until they checked their database at Annino’s request. Two years ago, California joined many other states in prohibiting the sentencing of young offenders to life in prison.

But that measure did not affect inmates who had already been sentenced.

Annino and others point to two trends in the 1980s that led to juveniles serving life terms. First was the national move to abolish parole, reflecting fears that violent criminals could not be safely released. Second was the increased prosecution of young criminals as adults.

In defense of its life-in-prison policy, Florida’s lawyers have pointed to several deadly attacks on European visitors carried out by young criminals.

These violent incidents were “threatening the state’s bedrock tourism industry,” Florida’s lawyers said in the opening paragraph of their brief to the Supreme Court in the Graham case.

Is a child still a child if he is also a felon?

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Montez wants a future. He wants to attend community college, study nursing and be a good role model for his little brother and sister. He doesn’t want to end up like his father, “in and out of jail.”

The 19-year-old shared his hopes over pizza and lemonade Friday inside the Minnesota Correctional Facility at Red Wing. The facility, whose facade resembles a tony private college save for the intimidating security fences, houses up to 175 of the state’s most violent and chronic juvenile offenders.

Montez was sentenced to Red Wing 13 months ago for burglary and drug offenses. Now he attends high school on campus, sings in a choir and volunteers. He also gets round-the-clock observance, counseling, life skills training and tough love from a staff trained in adolescent development.

He likely has no idea how lucky he is.

More than 2,000 young offenders nationwide never had a Red Wing option. Instead, they landed immediately in adult prisons. In Minnesota, 33 offenders serving life sentences in adult prisons were under 18 at the time of commitment.

Whether this is best for the offender or society is a question re-emerging on Minnesota’s and the nation’s radar. We should all pay attention.

In a few weeks the U.S. Supreme Court will consider whether sending a juvenile in non-homicide cases to life in adult prison, with no chance of parole, constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. This comes on the heels of a comprehensive study from the University of Texas at Austin LBJ School of Public Affairs that reviewed juvenile conviction practices across the country.

Author Michele Deitch found that 27 states allow children ages 12 and under to be prosecuted as adults. In 22 of those states, children as young as 7 can face adult punishment.

In Minnesota, a child must be 14, but some lawmakers keep working to make it 13 in the most egregious cases. Their mantra: Adult crime, adult time.

Here’s the problem: If the goal is keeping kids from becoming career criminals and increasing public safety, adult lock-ups typically are counterproductive. Young offenders face increased risks of physical and sexual assault in adult settings. If they don’t commit suicide (the rates are high) many adolescents are released more wounded and angry than when they went in. Deitch also is alarmed that determinations about whether a child is tried as an adult are marked “by extreme arbitrariness, unpredictability and racial disparities.”

Perhaps most compelling is a growing body of research showing that the brain is not fully developed until age 25, leading to more risk-taking and less understanding of consequences, but also more hope for rehabilitation.

“There are exceptions, but public safety is best served by not making adult sentencing the rule,” said Josh Milow, chair of the Minnesota Corrections Association Legislative Committee, which vigorously opposes lowering the age at which a child can be tried as an adult.

Not everybody buys it.

Rep. Bud Nornes, R-Fergus Falls, has tried three times to pass legislation to lower the age of adult certification to 13, after a boy that age killed the little girl of a family in his district. Suffering the worse loss imaginable, “they felt that this was one way to get through this, which is pretty impossible to do,” Nornes said. “It’s not dramatically changing state law.”

He’s adamant that 13-year-olds “know the difference between right and wrong. I have grandkids that age. A 13-year-old is able to do a lot of things, including drive a four-wheeler and hunt with Dad. It takes judgment, and I think a 13-year-old has some.”

Those on the other side respect the pain of crime victims.

“When I go to Capitol hearings, my God, the scenarios you hear are just horrendous. … But reducing public policy to emotion-level decision-making is never good public policy,” said Curt Peterson, director of the Juvenile Justice Coalition of Minnesota.

At Red Wing, which houses sexual offenders, gang members and some teenagers there for murder, the rehabilitation rate is 65 percent. Warden Otis Zanders, who spent 20 years in adult facilities before coming to Red Wing 13 years ago, calls those results “extremely good.”

Could those young men have been rehabilitated in adult prison? He’s seen it happen. But he believes good outcomes are far more likely at a place like Red Wing, which zeroes in on impulse and anger control, moral reasoning and basic skills training.

“Our job is to repair kids,” Zanders said.

The fully supervised youth eat meals together and visit a senior center to dance with residents. Many sing in a choir directed by Metropolitan Boys Choir director Bea Hasselmann. Music, said Hasselmann, who has made a weekly trek to Red Wing for eight years, reaches them in powerful ways. One perplexed inmate told her: “When I sing, my eyes water.”

Seventeen-year-old Marvin, in for first-degree assault, sang in Hasselmann’s choir during Friday’s quarterly graduation, and won the campus-wide Peacemaker Award. “I don’t think it will be tricky at all to stay on track,” said Marvin, who departs next month on parole. Time will tell.

Ultimately, said MCA’s Milow, “95 percent of offenders who go into prison are going to come out. We really have to look at what they’re going to be.”

Gail Rosenblum • 612-673-7350 • [email protected]

Jail wasted on juvenile offenders: study

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LOCKING up juvenile offenders appeared to have no greater deterrent effect on the rate of reoffending than lesser non-custodial penalties, a new study revealed.

The finding broadly contradicted two earlier studies, one which found juveniles given custodial sentences were more likely to reoffend and another which found lower reoffending rates for jailed car thieves but higher rates for those locked away for other offences.

The latest study, released today by the Australian Institute of Criminology, involved a detailed assessment of 152 juvenile offenders given detention sentences and 243 handed a non-custodial sentence, all in NSW.

All were interviewed at length about family life, school performance, drug abuse and association with delinquent peers.

“The results of this study suggest that, other things being equal, juveniles given custodial orders are no less likely to reoffend than juveniles given non-custodial orders,” the study authors concluded.

The differing findings of the latest study were probably due to more detailed consideration of the juveniles’ prior criminal records, they said.

On an average day almost 1000 young people were in custody across Australia, at a high cost to the community.

In NSW, only 10.3 per cent of juveniles appearing in the NSW Children’s Court in 2007 were locked up, but they accounted for almost half the budget of the NSW Department of Juvenile Justice.

Despite that cost, actual research on the impact of juvenile detention was scanty, with previous research conducted in 1974 and 1996.

The latest study found about half of each group reoffended during the follow-up period, with mean time to reconviction about five months.

That is consistent with overseas studies which pointed to significant future penalties imposed on those who had served jail time, particularly reduced employment prospects.

Mental Health America adopts policy opposing JLWOP

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Mental Health America has adopted a strong policy opposing sentences of life without parole for juvenile offenders, calling such punishment “inconsistent with any of the purposes which ordinarily guide sentencing.”

The policy was adopted by Mental Health America’s Board of Directors at its September meeting. The U.S. Supreme Court will consider whether such sentences are cruel and unusual punishment this term.

The United States is one of the few countries in the world that sentences juveniles to life without parole. In 42 states and under federal law, children who are too young to legally buy cigarettes are being tried for crimes as adults and if convicted can be sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.

There are currently at least 2,500 youthful offenders serving life without parole in U.S. prisons. Nationally, 59 percent of these individuals received their sentences for their first ever criminal conviction. Sixteen percent were between the ages of 13 and 15 when they committed their crimes, and 26% were sentenced under a felony murder charge where their offense did not involved carrying a weapon or pulling a trigger.

“Sentencing, including sentencing to imprisonment, has long been guided by four considerations: deterrence, retribution, incapacitation and rehabilitation. None of these purposes are served by sentencing juveniles to life without parole,” the policy position states.

“Victims of child abuse and neglect are over-represented among incarcerated juveniles, including those serving life without parole. Studies of this population also consistently demonstrate a high incidence of mental health and substance use disorders, serious brain injuries, and learning disabilities. In many instances, these juveniles have not received adequate diagnostic assessments or interventions.”

The policy also notes that such sentences violate international law and the Convention of the Rights of the Child, which has been ratified by every country in the world, except Somalia and the United States.

Mental Health America is also encouraging its more than 300 affiliates to work to repeal laws in those states which permit a sentence of life without parole. And it urges mental health advocates, professionals and other service providers work to ensure that juveniles are provided with appropriate services while incarcerated whose goal is to identify and ameliorate those problems which may have led to the crime and which need to be addressed before release will be safe and appropriate.

Source
Mental Health America

Man serving life without parole, finds support from unlikely people

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(NECN: Brad Puffer) – It was 1992. A murder of an MIT exchange student by a Cambridge teenager fueled tensions between the city and university. But of the three Cambridge teenagers involved in the fight that night, only one remains in prison. Now an effort is underway to ask the Governor to commute his sentence. And as NECN’s Brad Puffer found out, he has found support from some unlikely people.

Joe Donovan is just 33 years old, and has already spent more than half his life behind bars. He is serving a life sentence with no chance of parole.

Joe Donovan, Convicted of Murder: “You’re a kid your hoping its all a dream you know like oh man maybe I’ll wake up in your bed and it will all be over I am still hoping for that but its not the case you know.”

Donovan is one of three teenagers convicted in the stabbing death of an MIT student from Norway back in 1992.

Joe Donovan: “It was me being an idiot punching a kid but not it my wildest dreams did I think that was going to turn into this.”

On that Friday night in September, Donovan says he was walking down Memorial Drive on the edge of campus. He was walking with two other teenagers from the neighborhood, teenagers he apparently did not know well. Donavan says he literally bumped into a young man speaking in another language.

Joe Donovan: “I said what the hell was that? And I heard him laughing.”

Donovan admits he started the fight. The punch broke his hand. But 15 year-old Shon McHugh pulled the knife and stabbed Yngve Raustein, killing him. Donovan claims he did not even know Raustein was stabbed until the group of boys had run away.

Joe Donovan: “He’s wiping something off and it’s a knife and I said what you are you doing and I said did you stab someone?”

Police said a wallet was stolen during the fight, that the teenagers had planned to steal from student’s lockers. Donovan was charged with felony murder – the same as first degree murder – because the murder happened “in the commission or attempted commission of a crime”.

Joe Donovan: “I didn’t kill anybody so who would think you could be charged with murder. I even ask him how do you charge all the people and he started telling me its joint venture we just charge everybody involved. And I am like how does that work? And he’s like hey it’s how the law goes you know.”

Donovan quickly learned that if prosecutors could prove he knew about the knife, the robbery plan and was willing to help, the murder charge could apply to him under the joint venture theory of law. These are facts that to this day Donovan denies he ever knew.

Joe Donovan: “I had no idea that any of this stuff happened because who would do something like that it’s kind of crazy.”

Shon McHugh, the teen who murdered Raustein was tried as a juvenile. He spent less than 11 years behind bars. The other teenager, Alfredo Valez, testified against Donovan at trial as part of a plea deal. He was released after serving less than a decade, is now married and has children.

Judge Robert Barton, Retired, Middlesex Superior Court: “When you look at what happened to the co-defendants in this this case it is unfair to have him doing any more time than he has done.”

Judge Robert Barton oversaw Donovan’s trial. He spent 22 years on the bench, sat through more than 100 murder cases. Now retired, he says this is the one case that sticks out.

Judge Robert Barton: “I see where a Martorano who gave evidence against an FBI agent who is a self-proclaimed assassin hired gun killer. He’s walking the street after doing 10 years he’s walking the street going to get a movie offer and Joe Donovan who is the least involved in my humble opinion in a felony murder is still doing time that’s not fair that’s not equitable.”

And because Donovan had just turned 17 years old – it meant he was tried as an adult.

Judge Robert Barton: “If this happened a couple weeks or months beforehand he would be treated as a juvenile he would be out on the street by now. ”

As Judge Barton looks over his notes from the trial- something else jumps out at him.

Judge Robert Barton: “Went to jury at 4pm on Oct 27th. Next day at 2pm verdict is back. They weren’t out long. They had to have had lunch. That’s not a hell of a lot of deliberations.”

Carolyn Butterworth, Juror: “It disturbed me for years and it still disturbs me.”

Carolyn Butterworth was one of those jurors. She was also one of several jurors with serious reservations about a guilty verdict. She is speaking publicly about the case for the first time.

Carolyn Butterworth: “Whether we thought he did it or didn’t do it it didn’t; matter what mattered is if someone died during an armed robbery it was murder. That was the law but in my heart he wasn’t guilty of murder.”

There was no option for manslaughter or a lesser charge. The jury was sequestered and wasn’t going home until a verdict was reached. Butterworth says many jurors had young children and were eager to return home.

Carolyn Butterworth: “You know you kind of had to turn because if you don’t turn we were never going home, and I had no idea we didn’t have to come up with a verdict we could have had a hung jury I don’t know how long it would last but there were many people who didn’t want to go back to that hotel room.”

So while there were questions over who had stolen the wallet and who knew. Whether the testimony of the key witness had been truthful. Those questions did not change the verdict.

Carolyn Butterworth: “Did I think the kid stole the wallet? No. Did he have a knife? No”

After less than a day of deliberating the jury found Donovan guilty of felony murder.

Carolyn Butterworth: “Did you know going in that when you convicted him of felony murder it would automatically be life without a parole? No I did not and the people in our jury pool I remember people saying oh he will get out in a few years, people said that.”

Now Butterworth looks back, wishing she had been older, had spoken up more, had stood her ground.

Carolyn Butterworth: “I feel there is an injustice I don’t know if he should be in jail I don’t know if he ever should have gone to jail.”

Joe Donovan Sr., Father: “I don’t think they really cared about justice they cared about conviction.”

Donovan’s father, Joe Sr., continues to relive the night of the murder, the choices made, the trial, and the conviction that sent his son to prison for life.

Joe Donovan Sr.: “I’m depressed. It’s been hard doing this for this long especially knowing he doesn’t deserve what he got.”

He also knows it could have been different had Joe just pled down to a lesser charge.

Joe Donovan Sr.: “They offered him second degree but he said Dad all I did was throw a punch, I don’t want to be known as a murderer for the rest of my life.”

Now Joe is working with several friends and advocates to ask the Governor to commute Donovan’s life sentence. A commutation hasn’t happened in Massachusetts since Governor William Weld held office. But he still holds out hope.

Joe Donovan Sr.: “If the Governor gives me a few minutes of his time and he looks at this case I am sure he would say this isn’t right.”

Even the family of Yngve Raustein apparently agrees. They would not speak directly to NECN, but referred us to a petition they signed for Donovan’s release, saying quote “the life without parole sentence was way too harsh”, and “he should be given a new chance.”

Joe Donovan: “They have a lot of heart you know, to forgive. I hurt his whole family probably hurt the science community the guy was a genius.”

Donovan says he wrote to the Raustein family so they would know he feels remorse for his actions.

Joe Donovan: “There was no way I could have ever known that what I did that it would lead to someone, their son dying, that was not my intention and I feel bad about it everyday.”

Donovan now spends a lot of time doing pencil drawings. He once had dreams of becoming an EMT. He now just dreams of being with his family, holding a job, outside of prison walls.

Joe Donovan: “It’s an existence I’m not sure I have a real life here. Do you believe you will get out one day? I hope it. I would like to believe it. I hope it.”

But it will take a Governor’s action to make that happen. Donovan’s attorneys will submit a formal request in September. More than 50 requests for commutation were denied even a hearing last year. But Donovan hopes maybe his case will be different.

NECN also contacted former Attorney General Tom Reilly. He was the District Attorney at the time Joe Donovan was convicted.

He declined comment and referred us to the Middlesex District Attorney’s office. They also chose not to comment for this story.

Clemency ruling delayed for lifers in Pa. prison

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National / World News 4:21 p.m. Thursday, September 3, 2009

By MICHAEL RUBINKAM

The Associated Press

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Two Pennsylvania inmates who have won plaudits for their decades-long efforts to reduce prison violence and counsel troubled youths will have to wait a little longer to hear whether their life sentences will be commuted.

The inmates, convicted murderers Tyrone Werts and William Fultz, were the first lifers to go before the state Board of Pardons since a federal judge decided that thousands of Pennsylvania inmates sentenced to life should have an easier path toward clemency.

U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo ruled June 11 in a lawsuit seeking to overturn a 1997 state constitutional amendment that toughened commutation standards for lifers. The pardons board has appealed the ruling, leading to Thursday’s vote to delay a clemency decision for Werts and Fultz until the appeal is decided.

The inmates’ supporters, who had anticipated that the board would vote to recommend commutation to the governor, said they were stunned and disappointed.

“This is heartbreaking. This is rough. I can’t believe it,” said the Rev. Paul Werts, who presented his brother’s case. “I expected a yes.”

Despite their good deeds in prison, the pair faced incredibly steep odds. Only three life sentences have been commuted since 1997, when Pennsylvania voters — outraged over a killing at the hands of a commuted inmate — amended the state constitution. Clemency for lifers hasn’t been common in Pennsylvania since the 1970s, when then-Gov. Milton Shapp freed 251 inmates.

The1997 amendment requires that inmates sentenced to life must receive a unanimous vote of the five-member pardons board before the governor may consider their commutation request — giving a single board member the power to block any inmate’s bid. Before then, lifers needed only a majority vote to get their case before the governor.

Opponents of the referendum argue it deprives lifers of any meaningful chance to win clemency. Pennsylvania leads the nation in the number of inmates serving life sentences who were juveniles when they committed their crimes. It’s also one of only six states in which a life sentence automatically means life without parole — so commutation is the only way lifers who have already spent decades behind bars can get out of prison.

“You can’t have a right without a remedy,” said Philadelphia attorney Stephen Whinston, who represents the Pennsylvania Prison Society, a prisoner advocacy group, in its long-running legal bid to get the amendment declared unconstitutional.

In his ruling, Caputo said the pardons board may not apply the tougher 1997 standard to inmates who committed their crimes before 1997 because the U.S. Constitution forbids ex post facto punishment. The decision — the latest ruling in the prison society’s 12-year-old lawsuit — could affect more than 3,000 of the 4,868 lifers in the state’s prisons.

The pardons board has asked the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn the lower court ruling. The board also asked to Caputo to stay his decision while the circuit court appeal is heard — meaning it could continue to operate under its preferred unanimity standard — but Caputo did not act on the request in time for the hearing.

Lt. Gov. Joe Scarnati, the pardon board’s chairman, said Thursday that the board had little choice but to delay decisions on Werts and Fultz because of the uncertainty over which legal standard it should use.

“We’re not clear if we need three votes or a unanimous vote in order to pardon these two lifers. And to take a vote that may conflict with a court ruling weeks down the road, I think, would be inappropriate,” he said.

The 1997 amendment was part of an anti-crime package advocated by then-Gov. Tom Ridge in the wake of a decision by his predecessor, Robert Casey, to grant clemency to convicted killer Reginald McFadden. After he was released, McFadden killed two people in New York and raped a third.

Supporters of the amendment say the murderers who make up Pennsylvania’s lifer population should face a high hurdle to freedom.

“We owe it to the victims and to society to ensure that while we do offer an avenue to clemency, it has to be a very high threshold,” said Michael Piecuch, a former prosecutor and executive director of the Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association. Clemency, he noted, is “not a right, it’s not an entitlement.”

Indeed, the family of Werts’ victim, William Bridgeman, opposes commutation of his sentence, according to state Victim Advocate Carol Lavery.

Werts, 57, of Philadelphia, was convicted of second-degree murder in 1975 for his role in Bridgeman’s slaying during a robbery at a speakeasy. Fultz, also 57 and from Philadelphia, was convicted of first-degree murder in 1975 in the fatal shooting of a teenager. Neither inmate was the triggerman, and both rejected plea deals that would have gotten them out of prison decades ago.

Werts and Fultz are considered model inmates at Graterford prison outside Philadelphia, where they have counseled at-risk teenagers and led efforts to reduce recidivism rates. Werts once prevented the rape of a prison teacher, while Fultz risked his life to deliver medicine to a prison staffer during a 1981 hostage crisis at Graterford.

“Allowing Mr. Werts to return to society is the right thing to do,” Upper Moreland TownshipPolice Chief Thomas Nestell III, who spent 23 years with the Philadelphia police department and has collaborated with Werts, told the board.

Fultz’s elderly mother, Barbara Fultz Green, sobbed as she begged the board to show mercy.

“I know my son, I love my son, and I’m praying every day I’ll live long enough to see him a free man again,” she said.

Calling Werts and Fultz “two remarkable men,” board member Russell A. Walsh, a psychologist, nevertheless recommended that the board postpone its decision.

The vote was unanimous.

___

September 03, 2009 04:21 PM EDT

Editorial: Parole reform

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Published: Thursday, September 3, 2009 at 6:01 a.m.

Twenty-six years ago in Florida, the Legislature passed a landmark criminal-sentencing bill that called for the gradual elimination of parole. Since 1995, no one sentenced to life in prison is eligible for parole.

Today, no inmates sentenced to state prison are eligible for early release under the conditions and supervision of the parole system.

The changes occurred in response to inconsistencies in the application of parole policies, recidivism by inmates granted release and widespread dissatisfaction with the criminal justice system.

Still, there are several reasons for Florida to reconsider its blanket policies against the use of parole.

One of the most compelling reasons is Florida’s status as the state having by far the most juveniles, 77, imprisoned for life for crimes that didn’t involve homicide.

A bill filed by state Rep. Mike Weinstein, a Republican who works in a prosecutor’s office, would make 68 of Florida’s 100,000 inmates eligible for parole. Those inmates were convicted of “non-homicide” offenses committed when they were 15 or younger and have served at least eight years.

As Lloyd Dunkelberger of The Sun’s Capital Bureau reported last month: “Florida has handed out more life sentences to juveniles for non-murder crimes than have all other states combined.”

The prevailing idea that juveniles who commit serious crimes should “do the time” is difficult to overcome. Even Weinstein agrees that juveniles facing life imprisonment made a “major mistake,” and some were convicted of heinous crimes (such as rape).

Yet, a state and society should also recognize that juveniles so young that they aren’t permitted – for their own good – to drive a car, buy cigarettes or alcohol or enter into contracts, ought to be given some considerations in sentencing and have an opportunity for rehabilitation and redemption.

Weinstein’s bill would provide, but not mandate, those opportunities and a chance at parole under strict conditions. A bill in Congress – HR 2289 – would do the same.

Perhaps the strongest argument in favor of parole for inmates convicted as youths is this: Though Florida has some of the toughest penal codes in the nation – inmates must serve more than 85 percent of their sentences – thousands of adult inmates are released from prison every month. They are released with few, if any, conditions and little post-release oversight; either because their sentences, for serious offenses, expire or because of prison overcrowding.

The Department of Corrections has recognized that policies for releasing inmates is insufficient to protect public safety and give ex-prisoners a chance to be productive and crime-free. To that end, the DOC has turned two prisons into “re-entry institutions” that offer basic education, substance-abuse treatment and lessons in skills needed to transition into life on the outside.

A new, improved parole system would help the DOC choose the inmates best suited for release and then monitor their behavior, while keeping those beyond hope incarcerated.

Whether or not the juveniles serving life terms for non-murder charges would be suited for parole and release from prison, no one knows. Weinstein’s bill would at least let the Parole Commission make that determination.

Salisbury Teen Gets Life Sentence for Murder

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Written by Kye Parsons

Posted: Sep 3, 2009 11:38 AM

SALISBURY, Md.- A Salisbury teenager will spend the rest of his life in prison for the murder of a 25-year-old Salisbury woman.

A Wicomico County Circuit Court judge on Wednesday sentenced 16-year-old Kenneth Alvira to life in prison without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder. He was also given 30 years in prison for armed carjacking with that sentence to run consecutively with the life term.

A jury found Alvira guilty in July of the fatal stabbing of Anitra Pirkle which occurred earlier this year.

Authorities say that on Jan. 22, Alvira and two women forced Pirkle to drive them from Salisbury to a Delmar, Md. field where they are accused of stabbing her six times with a large sword or dagger before abandoning her there to die.

During Alvira’s trial, prosecutors presented evidence that tied Alvira to Pirkle’s car as well as the weapon used to kill her. In his defense, Alvira claimed that he did not stab Pirkle but blamed one of the women. But Alvira’s explanation did not convince the jury which only took a few hours to find him guilty of murder and related charges.

A jury in August convicted 19-year-old Brianna Brinkley of first-degree murder in Pirkle’s stabbing death. Brinkley is scheduled for sentencing on Oct. 23.

Twenty-year-old Brittany Barkley, who was also arrested in connection with Pirkle’s slaying, is scheduled to go to trial on Sept. 28.

Alvarado teen sentenced to life without parole for killing store clerk

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Posted Wednesday, Sep. 02, 2009

By MARTHA DELLER

[email protected]

An Alvarado teenager has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the 2008 robbery-slaying of a 52-year-old convenience store clerk.

A Johnson County jury deliberated about an hour Friday before convicting 17-year-old Scottie Louis Forcey of capital murder in the July 23, 2008, shooting death of Karen Burke, a clerk at the Shell Travel Center off Interstate 35W in Alvarado.

State District Judge Wayne Bridewell then sentenced Forcey to life without parole, the only punishment option since 2005, when the U.S. Supreme Court banned death sentences for defendants who were 17 and younger at the time the crime was committed.

Forcey will be the fifth Texan under 18 sentenced to life without parole, according to defense attorney Bill Mason, who unsuccessfully challenged the constitutionality of that sentence at a pretrial hearing.

Mason cited a new law adopted by the Legislature this year that changes the punishment for those teenagers to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 40 years. But the law applies only to crimes committed before the new law took effect Tuesday.

Forcey was 16 when he was accused of walking into the store where Burke was mopping the floor early one morning and shooting her in the head without saying a word. During a four-day trial in the 249th District Court, District Attorney Dale Hanna and Assistant District Attorneys Martin Strahan and Larry Chambless called more than 20 witnesses, including Burke’s daughter, Forcey’s brother and girlfriend and a number of forensic experts who linked physical evidence to Forcey.

Forcey’s brother, Billy, and several other witnesses testified that Forcey made statements about the crime when he returned from the store.

A .22-caliber handgun believed to have been the murder weapon was found beneath an abandoned house near Forcey’s home, and clothing that matched that worn by the gunman captured on a store surveillance camera was found under a vacant house near Forcey’s home, witnesses said.

Review Florida's parole policies

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Opinion

Legislation aimed at inmates convicted as juveniles is a start

Published: Tuesday, September 1, 2009 at 1:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Monday, August 31, 2009 at 8:25 p.m.

Parole isn’t popular with the public — even if it’s used sparingly — and politicians know it.

Twenty-six years ago in Florida, the Legislature passed a landmark criminal-sentencing bill that called for the gradual elimination of parole. Subsequent changes in state law mean that, since 1995, no one — not even juveniles — sentenced to life in prison are eligible for parole. Today, no inmates sentenced to state prison are eligible for early release under the conditions and supervision of the parole system.

The changes occurred in response to inconsistencies in the application of parole policies, recidivism by inmates granted release and widespread dissatisfaction with the criminal justice system.

So, it’s no surprise that an effort to reauthorize the possibility of parole in a limited number of cases — involving inmates who committed crimes when they were juveniles — failed during this year’s session of the Legislature and faces tough resistance next year.

Yet there are several reasons for Florida to reconsider its blanket policies against the use of parole.

One of the most compelling reasons is Florida’s status as the state having by far the most juveniles — 77 — imprisoned for life for crimes that didn’t involve homicide.

Unusual punishment

A bill filed by state Rep. Mike Weinstein, a Republican who works in a prosecutor’s office, would make 68 of Florida’s 100,000 inmates eligible for parole. Those inmates were convicted of “non-homicide” offenses committed when they were 15 or younger and have served at least eight years.

Florida’s practice of sentencing juveniles to life in prison without a chance of parole will be tested in a case that goes before the U.S. Supreme Court in November. The question before the court will be whether Florida’s practice violates the constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

Research by Florida State University’s Public Interest Law Center shows the practice is certainly unusual.

Florida has the third-highest number of inmates in the nation, so it follows that the state would have a lot of juveniles in prison. But, as Lloyd Dunkelberger of the Herald-Tribune’s Capital Bureau reported last month: “Florida has handed out more life sentences to juveniles for non-murder crimes than have all other states combined.”

The prevailing idea that juveniles who commit serious crimes should “do the time” is difficult to overcome. Even Weinstein agrees that, at best, juveniles facing life imprisonment made a “major mistake” and, at worst, were convicted of heinous crimes (such as rape).

Yet, a state and society should also recognize that juveniles so young that they aren’t permitted — for their own good — to drive a car, buy cigarettes or alcohol or enter into contracts ought to be given some considerations in sentencing and have an opportunity for rehabilitation and redemption.

Weinstein’s bill would provide, but not mandate, those opportunities and a chance at parole under strict conditions. A bill in Congress — HR 2289 — would do the same.

Thousands released every month

Perhaps the strongest argument in favor of parole for inmates convicted as youths is this: Though Florida has some of the toughest penal codes in the nation — inmates must serve more than 85 percent of their sentences — thousands of adult inmates are released from prison every month. They are released — with few, if any, conditions and little post-release oversight — either because their sentences, for serious offenses, expire or because of prison overcrowding.

The Department of Corrections has recognized that policies for releasing inmates is insufficient to protect public safety and give ex-prisoners a chance to be productive and crime-free. To that end, the DOC has turned two prisons into “re-entry institutions” that offer basic education, substance-abuse treatment and lessons in skills needed to transition into life on the outside.

A new, improved parole system would help the DOC choose the inmates best suited for release and then monitor their behavior, while keeping those beyond hope incarcerated. Whether or not the juveniles serving life terms for non-murder charges would be suited for parole and release from prison, no one knows. Weinstein’s bill would at least let the Parole Commission make that determination.

This story appeared in print on page A6