Retroactive justice: The court extends its ban on life terms for youths

Thousands of prisoners across the country who were sentenced to life imprisonment for crimes committed when they were juveniles could soon have their sentences significantly reduced thanks to a United States Supreme Court ruling on Monday.

Don’t expect the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling Monday that grants hundreds of prisoners convicted of murder as juveniles the chance of parole to have a big impact in Iowa.

The decision could give those previously locked away for life the same chance for lesser sentences now given to all such juvenile killers, following the court’s 2012 ruling striking down mandatory life sentences for juveniles. In two dissenting opinions, Justice Scalia said the Court had no jurisdiction to decide the case, and even if it did, it would not be unconstitutional for the state to “apply the law as it existed when the state prisoner was convicted and sentenced”.

A total of 2,341 people are now serving mandatory sentences of life without parole for juvenile offenses.

“Henry Montgomery has spent each day of the past 46 years knowing that he was condemned to die in prison”, Kennedy said. “The opportunity for release will be afforded to those who demonstrate… that children who commit even heinous crimes are capable of change”.

The majority included Chief Justice John Roberts, who had dissented from the 2012 ruling. Monday’s decision sends Montgomery’s case back to lower courts. Avoid all the utterly impossible nonsense we’ve required for sentencing juvenile homicide offenders by simply considering them for parole. “A state may remedy a Miller violation by permitting juvenile homicide offenders to be considered for parole, rather than by resentencing them”, Kennedy wrote.

The SPLC says this is a major milestone and efforts will be continued to reform the way juveniles are prosecuted and sentenced.

The Supreme Court said its 2012 decision Miller v. Alabama is retroactive, and it binds state courts in collateral-review proceedings.

In addition to Scalia, the other dissenters were Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito Jr. All but seven states – Alabama, Colorado, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana and Pennsylvania – are in compliance with the ruling already.

“It’s much better to rehabilitate someone and have them become a productive member of society than to incarcerate them for life”, he said. The sector has also been proactive specifically for juveniles serving life sentences, with or without parole. Although critics argue all criminals should be punished accordingly, the high court has shown a degree of sympathy based on the offender’s age when they committed the crimes.

Becky Wilson, one of Hurt’s three surviving children, said she was disappointed but not bitter or upset with the Supreme Court’s pronouncement.

“Because retribution ‘relates to an offender’s blameworthiness, the case for retribution is not as strong with a minor as with an adult, ‘” Montgomery explains.