No Life without Parole for Youths

**Red_Lizard2** · 05-17-10, 08:45 PM

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8688051.stm

US youths can no longer be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for crimes other than murder, the Supreme Court has ruled.

The court upheld an appeal by a Florida man who was sentenced to life at the age of 17 for armed burglary.

His lawyers argued that the sentence infringed the US constitution's banning of "cruel and unusual" punishments...

yes, I'm sort of lying in the title and on purpose. So if you clicked on this thread due to the title, it worked :9

anyways, thoughts?

**DonVitoJr** · 05-17-10, 08:52 PM

Nice to see our legal system doing something for once. Now, can congress do the same?

**DJ Ms. White** · 05-17-10, 08:53 PM

The age limit should be lower...you can't say you don't know right from wrong at 17.

**DJ Ms. White** · 05-17-10, 08:54 PM

Originally Posted by DonVitoJr

Nice to see our legal system doing something for once. Now, can congress do the same?

They did. It's called health care reform that didn't go far enough.

**Anti-Squeaker** · 05-17-10, 09:00 PM

Originally Posted by Mr. White

Originally Posted by DonVitoJr

Nice to see our legal system doing something for once. Now, can congress do the same?

They did. It's called health care reform that didn't go far enough.

Agreed.

And conservative rage incoming in 5....4....3....

**CivilWars** · 05-17-10, 09:02 PM

Cant quote on my phone, but the answer to what congress did is What is pr0n, Alex?

**Alundil** · 05-17-10, 09:07 PM

Originally Posted by Mr. White

Originally Posted by DonVitoJr

Nice to see our legal system doing something for once. Now, can congress do the same?

They did. It's called health care reform that didn't go far enough.

Oh boy - way too early to thread jack this one.....

Originally Posted by Mr. White

The age limit should be lower...you can't say you don't know right from wrong at 17.

I would concur with this.

Though in general, I would agree with the ruling on this one. I saw this one shortly after posting about the other thread I started (US vs Comstock, et al.).
However, I can also agree with the dissent by Roberts (and this falls under White's comment about age IMO) that a life sentence with no possibility of parole is not always unconstitutional and the example given is this:

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joined them in rejecting the outcome of Graham's case, saying the sentence was harsh given the crime. But he did not join the opinion that the sentence of life without parole is always unconstitutional.

"Some crimes are so heinous, and some juvenile offenders so highly culpable, that a sentence of life without parole may be entirely justified under the Constitution," Roberts wrote.

And this is one of the comments from Thomas' dissent:

Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a stinging dissent, saying the majority's interpretation of the Eighth Amendment is "entirely the court's creation."

"The court is quite willing to accept that a 17-year-old who pulls the trigger on a firearm can demonstrate sufficient depravity and irredeemability to be denied reentry into society, but insists that a 17-year-old who rapes an 8-year-old and leaves her for dead does not," Thomas wrote. "The question of what acts are 'deserving' of what punishments is bound so tightly with questions of morality and social conditions as to make it, almost by definition, a question for legislative resolution."

His dissent was joined in full by Justice Antonin Scalia and in part by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.