Global Breaking News - Monday, December 23, 2024

Reconsidering Young Lifers’ Sentences
In the wake of last year’s Supreme Court ruling in Miller v. Alabama that juveniles may never receive a mandatory sentence of life without parole, The Times editorial board has called for courts and legislators to apply this principle regardless of the date of conviction. Courts in some states agree. Earlier this month, the Louisiana Supreme Court took on this question in the case of Darryl Tate, who was 17 when he robbed two men and killed one of them in 1981. Should all people in prison for life without parole who committed their crimes before their 18th birthday be eligible for a new sentencing hearing?
* in the wake of ~ = ~에 뒤이어(결과로서)/ juvenile = 청소년/ parole = 가석방/ 평생(종신)의/ be eligible for ~ = ~의 대상이 되다, 자격이 있다

 18번째 생일전에 죄를 지어 종신형을 받은 모든 죄수들은 새로운 선거공판의 자격이 주어져야 하나요?

1. Give Them Another Chance
Given the court’s rulings, people currently serving mandatory life-without-parole sentences for crimes committed as youth deserve a review to determine whether they are fit to return to the community.

2. Judgments Should Remain Intact
We shouldn't go back and reopen prior murder cases committed by a juvenile. For cases where a person has truly reformed, there is always the safety valve of executive clemency.

3. The Problem With Retroactivity Rules
Juvenile justice advocates shouldn't place their faith in federal courts; states are allowed to take a broader view of retroactivity. And state executives are allowed to commute unjust sentences.

4. It Won’t Be Easy, But It Must Be Done
The just and moral question is why would the Miller v. Alabama Supreme Court decision not be applied to all those who were sentenced as a young person to life without parole?

5. Time to Affirm What We Mean by ‘Juvenile’
Shifting young people out of the adult criminal justice system altogether and into the juvenile justice system is the right thing to do.

Sample Essay

Judgments Should Remain Intact

Is the guy blowing out 18 candles on his birthday cake a fundamentally different person than he was the day before? Of course not. It is one thing to say, as a general matter, that “children” are different from “adults” and quite another to say that people are neatly divided into two discrete groups, cleanly separated at the 18th birthday. The notion that science supports such a sharp division is preposterous.

All murders warrant severe punishment, but some are particularly aggravated murders, like torture murders or rape followed by killing the rape victim to keep her quiet. For a person past the 18th birthday, the penalty for such crimes in many states is either death or life without parole. A lesser sentence is not an option. In 2005, the Supreme Court ruled out the death penalty for those even a day shy of their 18th birthday, so that left life without parole.

Last year in Miller v. Alabama, the high court invented yet another rule out of thin air and engrafted it onto the Constitution. If a murderer is a day short of 18, even for the most extreme category of murder, the judge must have discretion to choose a sentence with a possibility of parole. Whether rightly or wrongly, that is the rule for all cases going forward and all cases pending on appeal at the time of the decision.

Does that mean we have to go back and reopen all the prior murder cases? What about the families of murder victims, who thought the killer was safely put away for good? Must they reopen the wounds and relive the horror in order to prevent release of a monstrous rapist-murderer?

Judgments properly rendered under the law in effect at the time should remain intact. For cases in which a person has truly reformed, there is always the safety valve of executive clemency.