By David G. Savage
Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON — Confronted with the stark reality of a 13-year old sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison, Supreme Court justices signaled Monday they are inclined to limit, or perhaps abolish, the use of life prison terms for young teenagers whose crimes do not involve murder.
Until now, the high court has often invoked the Constitution’s ban on “cruel and unusual punishment” to restrict the death penalty. But on Monday, the justices sounded ready to rule that some states, in particular Florida, have gone too far by sentencing young teenagers to life in prison without a chance for a parole.
“To say to any child of 13 that you are only fit to die in prison is cruel,” attorney Bryan Stevenson told the court. “It cannot be reconciled with what we know about the nature of children. It cannot be reconciled with our standards of decency.”
He is representing Joe Sullivan, who at age 13 was convicted of raping a 72-year-old woman in 1989 and given a life prison term. Stevenson said rapists in Florida are sentenced, on average, to 10 years in prison. Yet Sullivan will die in prison unless the Supreme Court intervenes.
A second case heard Monday involves Terrance Graham, who at 17 was given a life term for his part in an armed robbery of a restaurant and a later home invasion robbery.
Sullivan and Graham are among 109 inmates nationwide who as minors were sentenced to life in prison without parole for non-homicide crimes.
The lawyers for Graham and Sullivan agreed their clients committed violent crimes and deserved to spend time behind bars. But they also argued they deserved a chance, at some time, to seek their release through parole.
Most of the justices sounded as though they were inclined to overturn at least some of these sentences. However, they differed on how. Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. offered a “case-by-case approach” that could overturn sentences if state judges failed to weigh an offender’s youth. But liberal justices hinted they would go further and rule it is always cruel and unusual to impose a life term for an offender who is younger than 18 and did not commit murder.
Copyright 2009 Chicago Tribune Company