by Necalli Ollin
The Wyoming Supreme Court recently handed down an important
ruling in the case of Davis v. Wyoming regarding prisoners who received life
without parole (LWOP) sentences when they were juveniles ("juvenile
lifers"). In its ruling the court detailed how thorough mitigation
hearings should become moving forward. They also strongly urged sentencing courts
not to repeat the mistakes of the past by arbitrarily meting out LWOP sentences
against youthful offenders.
The court referenced the 2016 Michigan Court of Appeals
ruling in People v. Hyatt, 316 Mich. App. 368, seven times to support the
reasoning for their decision. This is significant because dozens of Michigan
juvenile lifers have been awaiting a decision by the Michigan Supreme Court so
they can be resentenced. The court will rule whether a judge or jury decides
the sentencing fate of juvenile lifers. To date only about 115 of Michigan's
363 juvenile lifers have been resentenced to term-of-year sentences ranging
from 25- to 40-year minimums. The other remaining 247 cases await resentencing.
In a 2012 landmark ruling the U.S. Supreme Court remarked in
the case of Miller v. Alabama, 132 S. Ct. 2455 (2012), that mandatory LWOP
sentences for juvenile offenders are unconstitutional. The high court ordered
all the affected 2,500 cases across the nation to be resentenced and made it
abundantly clear that instances of juveniles receiving LWOP must become
"rare" and "uncommon," and only reserved for prisoners who
are incapable of change the remainder of their lives. It is an enterprise the
Wyoming Supreme Court recently stated "is difficult, if not
impossible" to determine.
According to the U.S. Supreme Court, "Deciding that a
juvenile offender will forever be a danger to society would require making a
judgment that [he] is incorrigible -- but incorrigibility is inconsistent with
youth and for the same reason, rehabilitation could not justify that sentence.
Life without parole foreswears the rehabilitative ideal. It reflects an
irrevocable judgment about [an offender's] value and place in society, at odds
with a child's capacity for change." (Miller, 132 S. Ct. at 2465)
Several Michigan prosecutors have rejected the stern rebuke
by the high court replacing the court's ruling with their own narrow, myopic,
and misguided views. They have also politicized and stalled resentencing
hearings for the remaining 240 juvenile cases awaiting hearings since 2012 by
pursuing unwarranted LWOP sentences against them. This makes the Michigan
Supreme Court's forthcoming ruling about juvenile lifers all the more important.
One instance of a juvenile lifer awaiting a resentencing
hearing who is not deserving of a LWOP sentence is Efren Paredes, Jr., a
45-year-old Latino who has been incarcerated since age 15. He was convicted for
the 1989 murder and robbery of a grocery store manager in St. Joseph, Michigan,
and sentenced to LWOP. He had no previous criminal record and was a high school
honor student at the time of his arrest. Three of his co-defendants received
considerable less time than he did. Two were released 13 years ago and one
received a six-month sentence. All three co-defendants were older than Paredes
at the time.
A review of Paredes' life during his incarceration reveals a
catalog of impressive accomplishments and dozens of examples of his capacity
for change. He helped lead a successful campaign to create an indigenous
charter middle school in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), has
become a Literary Braille Transcriber certified by the U.S. Library of
Congress, and a mentor to other prisoners and students outside of prison. He
has also received letters of commendation from career Michigan Department of
Corrections professionals about his positive attitude and leadership. In 2016
LATINA magazine named him one of four Latina/o prisoners in the nation
deserving of clemency.
Though Paredes presents compelling evidence of a juvenile
offender deserving a term-of-year sentence and the opportunity to become a
productive member of society once again, the Berrien County Prosecutor's Office
has pursued a LWOP sentence against him. His case is only one among the scores
of egregious examples of injustice occurring in juvenile lifer cases across the
state. Additional information about the Paredes case is available at
www.fb.com/Free.Efren. An online petition expressing support for his release is
also available at www.TinyURL.com/Efren1016.
There is little doubt that members of the court have seen
repeated instances of clear and convincing evidence of how far Michigan
prosecutors have strayed from U.S. Supreme Court rulings about the treatment of
juvenile lifers over the past several years. Prosecutors have demonstrated
their refusal to follow the rule of law even when it is unequivocal and absent
ambiguity. The court now has a historic opportunity to end their abuse of
authority and flagrant violations of the U.S. Constitution by abolishing LWOP
for Michigan juvenile lifers altogether.
The trend of the nation continues to move in the direction of
abandoning the pernicious practice of condemning children to die in prison.
Currently less than half the states in the nation are imposing LWOP sentences
on juveniles, and states are increasingly legislating an end to these
deplorable sentences. Their actions are a symbol of the evolving standards of
decency of a civilized society. It is a trend that is making its way to the
doorstep of the U.S. Supreme Court and will eventually result in abolishment of
the sentence altogether.
Allowing prosecutors to
continue hijacking the resentencing process could result in potentially
repeating the resentencing of hundreds of juvenile lifers at least two more
times between now and the time the U.S. Supreme Court issues a total ban on
juvenile LWOP sentences. It will also result in each case being appealed and
creating unnecessary work for our appellate courts.
Since the 2012 U.S. Supreme Court ruling ending mandatory
LWOP sentences for juvenile offenders the Michigan Court of Appeals has
reversed every case in which a juvenile lifer has been resentenced to a LWOP
sentence. This is the same outcome that will potentially unfold in hundreds
more cases, creating a costly burden to taxpayers and wasting valuable judicial
time and resources, if allowed to remain unchecked.
Rendering any ruling other than a total ban on LWOP sentences
for juvenile offenders will be impotent to reign in the rogue actions of obstinate
prosecutors. They have already demonstrated a blatant disregard to adhere to
rulings of the highest court in the nation and a willingness to undermine them
with impunity. It is a clear message to the Michigan Supreme Court that
anything short of abolishing juvenile LWOP sentences will result in prosecutors
impugning the integrity of the court and demonstrating contempt for their
ruling as well.
The Michigan Supreme Court must boldly exercise its
stewardship if it intends to prevent prosecutors from feeling they are above
the law by continually using juvenile lifer resentencing hearings as a
playground for political gamesmanship.
* * * *
The following are excerpts from the recent Wyoming Supreme
Court ruling in Davis v. Wyoming, 2018 WY 40 (Wyo. 2018):
"We recognize that the task of determining whether a
juvenile is permanently incorrigible is difficult, if not impossible. The Roper
Court remarked, '[i]t is difficult even for expert psychologists to
differentiate between the juvenile offender whose crime reflects unfortunate
yet transient immaturity, and the rare juvenile offender whose crime reflects
irreparable corruption.' (Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. at 573, 125 S. Ct. at 1197
(2005) (citing Laurence Steinberg & Elizabeth Scott, "Less Guilty by
Reason of Adolescence," 58 Am. Psychologist 1009, 1014-16 (2003)). 'If
this determination is difficult for even trained psychologists, we would be
remiss if we did not acknowledge our concerns about sentencing courts -- or
reviewing courts for that matter -- accurately assessing, or in essence
forecasting, whether an individual who committed a crime while still a minor is
and will remain irreparably corrupt for the rest of his or her life and on the
basis of that assessment accurately meting out a proportionate sentence.'
(People v. Hyatt, 891 N.W.2d 549, 573-74 (Mich. App. 2016)), appeal denied,
(People v. Williams, 888 N.W.2d 64 (Mich. 2016))." (Paragraph 35)
"The Supreme Court made clear that a sentencing court
must determine that a juvenile is irreparably corrupt or permanently
incorrigible prior to imposing a sentence of life without parole: 'Even if a
court considers a child's age before sentencing him or her to a lifetime in
prison, that sentence still violates the Eighth Amendment for a child whose crime
reflects 'unfortunate yet transient immaturity.' (Montgomery v. Louisiana, 136
S. Ct. at 734 (2016) (quoting Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. at 479-80, 132 S. Ct.
at 2469 (2012)) (quoting Roper, 543 U.S. at 573, 125 S. Ct. at 1197))."
(Paragraph 38)
"A sentencing court must begin its analysis with the
premise that in all but the rarest of circumstances, a life-without-parole (or
the functional equivalent thereof) sentence will likely be disproportionate for
the juvenile before it. (See Hyatt, 891 N.W.2d at 574) ('A sentencing court
must operate under the understanding that life without parole is, more often
than not, not just inappropriate, but a violation of the juvenile's
constitutional rights.') ... '[T]he vast majority of adolescents change as they
age." (Commonwealth v. Batts, 163 A.3d at 452 (Pa. 2017))."
(Paragraph 44)
'[M]inimal risk is associated with an erroneous decision in
favor of the juvenile: sentencing the juvenile to a term of years with the
possibility of parole when that juvenile is one of the rare individuals
incapable of rehabilitation would simply mean that, while eligible for parole,
the unrehabilitated juvenile would likely never obtain release on parole and
would spend the rest of his life in prison." (Paragraph 49)
"'To protect youthful offenders from erroneous decisions
that foreclose their ability to ever be released from prison, the Supreme Court
therefore held that a sentence of life without parole is disproportionate and
illegal for a juvenile offender unless that defendant 'exhibits such
irretrievable depravity that rehabilitation is impossible.' (Montgomery, 136 S.
Ct. at 733 (citing Miller, 567 U.S. at 479-80, 132 S. Ct. 2455))[.]' Batts, 163
A.3d at 455 (emphasis in original)." (Paragraph 50)
"[S]ee also (State v. Seats, 865 N.W.2d at 557 (Iowa
2015)) ('We must be cognizant of the fact that a sentence of life in prison
without the possibility of parole for a juvenile is the equivalent of the death
penalty for juveniles.')" (Paragraph 68)
"Miller contains no suggestion that a seventeen-year-old
is more deserving of adult punishment than a sixteen-year-old. Rather, Miller
recognized that 'youth is more than a chronological fact' and is 'itself a
relevant mitigating factor of great weight.' (Miller, 567 U.S. at 476, 132 S.
Ct. at 2467 (citing Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U.S. 104, 115, 116, 102 S. Ct.
869, 877, 878, 71 L.Ed.2d 1 (1982))." (Paragraph 76)
"The nature of the
crime alone will generally be insufficient to support a conclusion that a
juvenile is irreparably depraved. ... '[T]he fact that a vile offense occurred
is not enough, by itself, to warrant imposition of a life-without-parole
sentence. The court must undertake a searching inquiry into the particular
juvenile, as well as the particular offense, and make the admittedly difficult
decision of determining whether this is the truly rare juvenile for whom life
without parole is constitutionally proportionate as compared to the more common
and constitutionally protected juvenile whose conduct was due to transient
immaturity for the reasons addressed by our United States Supreme Court.'
(Hyatt, 891 N.W.2d at 575); see also (Adams v. Alabama, 136 S. Ct. 1796, 1800,
195 L.Ed.2d 251 (2016) (Sotomayor, J., concurring, joined by Ginsburg, J.)
(referring to the 'Court's repeated exhortation that the gruesomeness of a
crime is not sufficient to demonstrate that a juvenile offender is beyond
redemption')); (People v. Padilla 209 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 221 (Cal. App. 2016)).
Miller recognized that none of the characteristics that distinguish a child
from an adult are 'crime-specific.' (Miller, 567 U.S. at 473, 132 S. Ct. at
2465)." (Paragraph 79)
"The district court also failed to recognized that 'peer
influence can play a more subtle role in adolescent behavior, as when teenagers
engage in behavior that they think will win peer approval ... or simply
encourage one another through group interaction.' (Elizabeth Scott et al.,
"Juvenile Sentencing Reform in a Constitutional Framework," 88 Temp.
L. Rev. 675, 699 (2016))" (Paragraph 81)
"Most juveniles will outgrow the signature qualities of
youth by the time their brain development is complete. (See Scott, supra, 88
Temp. L. Rev. at 700). Juveniles are more likely to change with available
treatment. Id. at 701. And, the seriousness of their crime does not alter these
propositions. Id. at 700." (Paragraph 91)
"A life-without-parole sentence 'means denial of hope;
it means that good behavior and character improvement are immaterial; it means
that whatever the future might hold in store for the mind and spirit of [the
convict], he will remain in prison for the rest of his days.' (Graham v.
Florida, 560 U.S. at 70, 130 S. Ct. at 2027 (2010) (quoting Naovarath v. State,
779 P.2d 944, 945 (Nev. 1989))." (Paragraph 94)
"Miller and Montgomery 'make clear that sentencing a
juvenile to life without parole is more than a simple consideration of a set of
factors.' (Hyatt, 891 N.W.2d at 579). Montgomery establishes a stringent
standard whereby a juvenile offender cannot be sentenced to life without parole
unless the sentencing court determines, based upon its analysis of the Miller
factors, that the juvenile is one of the truly rare individuals incapable of
reform." (Paragraph 104)
"[T]he district court abused its discretion by failing
to make a finding of permanent incorrigibility based upon its analysis of all
the Miller factors. When the Miller factors are not properly considered and
weighed and when there is no finding of permanent incorrigibility, or when a
finding of permanent incorrigibility is not supported by the Miller factors,
the resulting sentence violates the Eighth Amendment." (Paragraph 106)
