Major Supreme Court Ruling: Kids Who Didn't Kill Anyone Should Not Have to Die in Prison

The Supreme Court has given a second chance to juveniles serving life without parole for non-homicide crimes.



Children who commit crimes other than murder can no longer face a sentence of life without parole, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday in a highly anticipated decision that civil rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson calls "an incredibly important win for kids who've been condemned to die in prison."

Stevenson represents Joe Sullivan, who was sentenced to life without parole (LWOP) when he was just 14 years old. Sullivan, one of 77 prisoners in Florida serving LWOP for non-homicide crimes committed before the age of 18, was the defendant in one of two related cases before the court. His case, Sullivan v. Florida, was "dismissed as improvidently granted" given the ruling in the other case, Graham v. Florida, which bluntly held that "the Constitution prohibits the imposition of a life without parole sentence on a juvenile offender who did not commit homicide." (Read AlterNet's two-part series on Sullivan and Graham for an explanation of both cases.)

The ruling was based heavily on the court's 2005 decision in Roper v. Simmons, which abolished the death penalty for juvenile defendants on the grounds that it violates the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy drew a parallel between the death penalty and life without parole, noting that while "it is true that a death sentence is 'unique in its severity and irrevocability,' (Gregg v. Georgia) ... life without parole sentences share some characteristics with death sentences that are shared by no other sentences."

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