Supreme Court Rules 5-4 That Juveniles Cannot Be Given 'Life Without Parole" In Non-Murder Cases.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=10666117

The Supreme Court has ruled that teenagers may not be locked up for life without chance of parole if they haven't killed anyone.

By a 5-4 vote Monday, the court says the Constitution requires that young people serving life sentences must at least be considered for release.

The court ruled in the case of Terrance Graham, who was implicated in armed robberies when he was 16 and 17. Graham, now 22, is in prison in Florida, which holds more than 70 percent of juvenile defendants locked up for life for crimes other than homicide.

"The state has denied him any chance to later demonstrate that he is fit to rejoin society based solely on a nonhomicide crime that he committed while he was a child in the eyes of the law," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion. "This the Eighth Amendment does not permit."

Chief Justice John Roberts agreed with Kennedy and the court's four liberal justices about Graham. But Roberts said he does not believe the ruling should extend to all young offenders who are locked up for crimes other than murder.

Edited May 17, 2010 by Paul and Vanessa

[Danno 1,228]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=10666117

The Supreme Court has ruled that teenagers may not be locked up for life without chance of parole if they haven't killed anyone.

By a 5-4 vote Monday, the court says the Constitution requires that young people serving life sentences must at least be considered for release.

The court ruled in the case of Terrance Graham, who was implicated in armed robberies when he was 16 and 17. Graham, now 22, is in prison in Florida, which holds more than 70 percent of juvenile defendants locked up for life for crimes other than homicide.

"The state has denied him any chance to later demonstrate that he is fit to rejoin society based solely on a nonhomicide crime that he committed while he was a child in the eyes of the law," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion. "This the Eighth Amendment does not permit."

Chief Justice John Roberts agreed with Kennedy and the court's four liberal justices about Graham. But Roberts said he does not believe the ruling should extend to all young offenders who are locked up for crimes other than murder.

While I too might agree, I wonder how they came to the conclusion that "The Constitution says" what we might agree on?

[Obama 2012 1,714]

While I too might agree, I wonder how they came to the conclusion that "The Constitution says" what we might agree on?

Amendment VIII

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted

^^ that's what they're calling life sentences w/o parole for youngsters.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Never mind the constitutionality of it - locking up juveniles for life without giving them at least a chance of rehabilitation (and surely they are more likely to benefit from it) is a huge imposition on the taxpayer.

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

The Supreme Court has a history of shifting back and forth on the issue of the 8th amendment. As Chief Justice Earl Warren said in 1958, the concept of "cruel and unusual" has to be defined according to the evolving standards of decency which are prevalent at the time. This makes the 8th amendment a moving target by it's own definition.

In the past, they have upheld life sentences for far lesser crimes than armed robbery. The argument has generally been that imprisonment for life is not, by itself, an extraordinary punishment that would fit the definition of "cruel and unusual".

It wasn't until the 1983 case of Solem v. Helm that the Supreme Court first considered the concept of proportionality, and determined that incarceration alone could constitute a cruel and unusual punishment if it was disproportionate to the crime. In that case, the court determined that proportionality could be determined by comparing the sentence with other sentences imposed for the same crime in the same and other jurisdictions, which was consistent with Warren's "evolving standards of decency". They backtracked on this concept in the 1991 case of Harmelin v. Michigan, when they sustained the life sentence for a person convicted of possession of 1.5 lbs of cocaine. In that case, Justices Scalia and Rehnquist noted that the 8th amendment contained no guarantee of proportionality.

Arguments against lengthy sentences for statutory minors has often been based on mental capacity - the concept that a minor may not fully comprehend the magnitude or consequences of the crime. This is another case where the Supreme Court has waffled on the issue, determining in the past that the death penalty was not cruel and unusual for a 17 year old convicted of murder, and now determining that life without parole may be cruel and unusual for a 17 year old convicted of armed robbery.

As far as I'm concerned, any sentence of life without the possibility of parole precludes Warren's "evolving standards of decency" because it locks in the standards at the time the sentence was imposed, without permitting future society to apply current standards in determining if a criminal has been sufficiently punished. Unfortunately, the decisions of judges and parole boards often don't reflect the prevailing standards of society, which is the very reason that minimum sentencing guidelines are established for some crimes.

I suspect this ruling will be revisited in the future, and the Supreme Court will probably move the line again.