Court Cases

We here at NOVJL are studying closely the process of these pending JLWOP Supreme Court cases. And we know that no matter which way the Court rules, there will be
more complicated underlying issues than just how the court sees the specific LWOP sentences of Messrs. Sullivan and Graham for their serious crimes that fell short of murder.

We are learning that the arguments being made by the advocates for the offenders have some far-reaching implications that worry us deeply, such as their attempts to ask the Court to approve standards only ever applied to the death penalty for these non-death cases. If the Court were to accept the arguments being made by the petitioners Graham and Sullivan, a whole new precedent of 8th amendment standards of "proportionality" could be applied to sentences of mere incarceration.

This has standard would be unprecedented in United States Jurisprudence. Some legal experts are saying the Constitutionality of Life sentences for extremely violent offenders who have demonstrated basic levels of maturity and culpability for their actions is such a "no-brainer" that it should be a 9-0 decision against Sullivan and Graham. Because the 8th Amendment has always only ever been applied to matters of torture and the death penalty, and then only VERY rarely. (There was also one time it was used in the 1800's to apply to someone who had been stripped of their citizenship for an offense not related.)

If the Supreme Court were to accept the argument that some form of incarceration also could be held to those standards of 8th amendment jurisprudence that allow judges to over rule the will of the people in the states that define the crimes and punishments (as completely required and rigidly defined by the 9th and 10th amendments to the US Constitution) then some legal scholars that literally legal chaos could ensue.

Incarceration sentences could potentially be in the hands of individual judges instead of duly empowered state legislatures. And here is the danger in a somewhat colloquially expressed example: One judge could potentially say to a murderer facing a long or life period of incarceration, "I know that the state law says you should get life for these murders, but hey you look like a nice guy to me, I think that's too harsh, and even though the state says you should get life, the Supreme Court tells me that I can do what I feel is proportional. I am only giving you 10 years."

We are confident that however else the Court rules on the many specific issues raised in these cases (i.e. the length of time necessary to file an 8th amendment challenge in an older case, etc), the Court will not overturn life sentences for violent offenders across the board, because what the defense attorneys are asking could have far-reaching and very negative consequences on the whole national criminal justice system.

The attorneys for the offenders who filed these cases before the Supreme Court are asking the court to potentially set a precedent that judges all over the nation be able to make decisions on what "feels fair and proportional" to them, almost virtually ignoring state laws and state legislatures who alone have the Constitutional authority to set crimes and penalties. There are not words for the scope of potential harm nationally that could result from such a precedent. There are many ways the Court could rule, and many issues they could address, but on this point the attorneys for the offenders are making an incredibly dangerous argument that must be roundly struck down by the Supreme Court.

Our defense of the unfortunate necessity of natural life sentences for some murder cases does not extend broadly. We know that JLWOP is an extremely serious penalty that should be used only when absolutely necessary to deliver the maximum punishment for the most dangerous offenders. We know that it needs reform, as do many areas of the criminal justice system. We support many reforms, as long as any retroactive proposals include FULL and ADVANCE victim notification and participation. We respect and support the Constitutionally mandated roles of state legislatures to set standards for their criminal courts. And that is where we are confident the Supreme Court will affirm them - in state legislatures where they can be rigorously debated and set according to our Constitutional Federal system.

1. The high level attention afforded a Supreme Court case should place an extra burden on all those involved on all sides of this JLWOP issue to include, inform, and support the victims of these crimes and to be TRUTHFUL and rigorously well-researched in all they put out. To date, we know that this has not been the case with the advocates for the offenders.

2. Any effort by advocates to extend the relevance of this court case about JLWOP in non-murder cases to murder cases should be rejected. Victims families have suffered enough and do not need the re-traumatization this added stress would create. The Supreme Court is not considering the applicability of life sentences for juveniles tried as adults for extremely serious murder cases.

3. The Attorneys on all sides are telling us they support all interested parties to submit amicus briefs about how the legal aspects of these cases affect them. NOVJL wants to establish a supportive relationship with all victims of all these kinds of crimes and hope to find them somehow.

4. The news media coverage of the SCOTUS process on these Florida cases should be careful to primarily focus on and tell the stories of the true horrific crimes at the heart of these cases. The news media should work to talk to the victims of these crimes. We have been very concerned up to now that the media has so easily and often bought into the incredibly well-funded offender propaganda machine that has put out so many half-truths and outright lies.

The advocacy PR machine for the offenders is slick and well-funded, resulting in some very one-sided and even misleading media coverage nationally to date. Its almost as if in the swarm to generate sympathy for the convicted murderers, the fact that there were deliberate and horrific crimes committed is totally forgotten. We are hopeful that the US Supreme Court will not forget the depth of the horror of these crimes in their deliberations and will pay appropriate attention to the victims of these crimes.

Analysis: Why two juvenile sentence cases?

Monday, May 4th, 2009 5:39 pm | Lyle Denniston | Print This Post

Analysis

With a continuing wave across the country of tougher punishment for youths who commit serious crimes, the Supreme Court on Monday returned to the constitutional controversy that the wave has stirred. The Court took on two new juvenile sentencing cases that, seemingly, raise the same issue, but apparently left itself the option of treating them differently. It did not explain, but a few reasons may be suggested.

In a way, it might be said that the Court has been waiting for a case to reach it clearly presenting this issue: is it unconstitutional, under the Eighth Amendment�s ban on �cruel and unusual punishment,� to impose a life prison sentence with no chance of early release on a teenager under age 18? Both new cases � Graham v. Florida (08-7412) and Sullivan v. Florida (08-7621) � raise that issue.

Advocates for youth have been arguing that such a sentence in effect amounts to a death-in-prison sentence, and thus should be judged by the same tough constitutional standard as a sentence directly imposing death. They thus have been seeking a chance to follow up on the Supreme Court�s 2005 decision in Roper v. Simmons, striking down altogether the death penalty for minors, a decision based partly on the theory that youths are not as responsible for their actions as adults.

The first post-Roper case to reach the Court testing the Eighth Amendment as it applied to long sentences for youths � Pittman v. South Carolina (07-8436) � was turned aside by the Justices last year. A 12-year-old, Christopher Frank Pittman, had been convicted of a double murder. He was given a 30-year prison sentence, without possibility of a parole. The Court turned aside that case on April 14 of last Term, apparently unready to examine a lengthy sentence when the crime victim was slain.

The next logical test case, it appeared, would be one in which a minor was given a life prison sentence for a crime in which the victim was not killed. The Court became aware last October that a case on that issue was on its way � the case of Joe Harris Sullivan, who was given life without parole in Florida after a conviction for sexual battery, a crime committed when he was 13 years old. Before that case was actually filed, however, the case of Terrance Jamar Graham arrived; he was given life without parole in Florida after violating his probation after an earlier guilty plea for armed burglary; he was 17 at the time of the life sentence.

Eventually, the Court considered the two cases together, examined them several times then granted them � separately � on Monday. It is quite common for the Court, when it has two or more cases raising the same issue, to pick only one for review, or to consolidate them for a joint ruling. It took neither option this time, setting the stage for two rulings, perhaps with different potential outcomes.

Sullivan�s case, as his lawyers fashioned it, is directly very specifically at life without parole for youths who are only 13 years old (or younger). Their petition contends that these younger children are more fully shielded by the Eighth Amendment than older teenagers � such as, presumably, a 17-year-old like Graham.

But the Sullivan petition raises a separate issue: is he entitled to a ruling on his Eighth Amendment challenge years after his conviction � he was sentenced nearly 20 years ago, and now is unable or very unlikely to be able to get any lower court to review his claim, yet, his lawyers say, the Court�s more recent Eighth Amendment rulings suggest that he should be able to test his sentence even now.

The Court will hear both issues, and thus there is at least a chance that Sullivan might not be allowed to raise his constitutional argument, because it could be found to have come too late.

The Graham case only involves the specific issue of an Eighth Amendment violation in a life without parole sentence for a minor. Thus, the Court may have wanted a second case before it in case it should find that Sullivan did not present that claim properly.

Another difference between the two, of course, is the youths� relative age. The Court, if it reached the life sentence issue in Sullivan, might be more sympathetic to a youth of his age getting a life term for a sexual crime that left the victim injured, but not dead. The Court last Term ruled out a death sentence for such a crime (in Kennedy v. Louisiana, involving a child victim who was not killed).

Graham, by contrast, is four years older, and was given a life prison term after returning to criminal activity after being spared a long prison term for an earlier episode. Some members of the Court may have found him a less sympathetic figure, and wanted to have that case on the docket to perhaps limit the scope of any ruling that went against life terms for teenagers.

Indeed, it might be speculated that the Court spent most of a month looking at these two cases as it tried to sort out just what it wanted before it, and the grant of both cases might well have been a compromise between the Court�s two ideological wings. The Court has been split deeply in its most recent rulings limiting the scope of the death penalty, and there is no reason to anticipate a more unified bench on this new controversy involving life without parole � a severe sentence for a minor.

The Court will hold oral argument on the two cases in the Term starting Oct. 5, very likely in tandem hearings on the same day.

Linked from the Offender Advocacy Website

Life Sentence for Juveniles? (Letter to the editor)

Monday, May 11th, 2009

New York Times

Court to review life sentences for young offenders

Tuesday, May 5th, 2009

Associated Press

Justices to hear appeals of lifers sentenced as teens

Monday, May 4th, 2009
CNN

SAMPLE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR on the Supreme Court Case

PLEASE ADAPT THIS WORDING TO YOUR OWN and send it to your local newspapers. It is good to include any local examples of extreme violent crime by local teens.
Letters to the Editor are usually easily sent in off the newspaper's website.

Dear Editor:
The United States Supreme Court will hear two important and related cases on November 9, 2009 - Sullivan and Graham v Florida. These cases are sure to be the most high profile and closely watched criminal cases before the Court this year.

There has been a great deal of misinformation circulated by well-funded offender advocates about the issue of violent teens and juvenile killers that will rarely receive the sentence of life in prison for the most heinous offenses. These few exceptional cases are not "children" -- most nationally are 17. And life sentences can only be given for those rare extreme crimes so awful that they cry out for the most serious punishment. [here would be a good place to mention any local examples of extremely violent teen crime].

Worse, if the Supreme Court were to accept their argument, it could endanger all long term and life sentences legally across the nation for all violent offenders. Attorneys for Graham and Sullivan are asking the Supreme Court for the first time ever to say that incarceration alone is a violation of the 8th Amendment's prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment. The 8th amendment has always and only ever been applied to torture and sometimes to executions, such as to the mentally ill. It has never been applied to long term or life sentences for murder and other extremely violent acts.

We urge the Supreme Court to reject the arguments being made by Sullivan and Graham, and support [Name your state's] continued ability to incarcerate murderers and extremely violent offenders.

More information is available at www.jlwopvictims.org and a downloadable research report called Adult Time for Adult Crime is available there and at www.heritage.org.

Thank you,
Your name and community

TALKING POINTS FOR EDITORIAL BOARDS

It is easier than you may think to get an appointment to talk to your local newspaper's editorial board about why they should write an editorial in support of victims of violent crime, and community safety, in advance of the Supreme Court considering this year the Sullivan and Graham v Florida cases.

First, we can get them a copy of the important report Adult Time for Adult Crime which strongly, and with sound research, makes the point for you regarding the importance of this case. And keep us posted about any discussions you have with editorial boards.

Then with you putting some personal local interest in their choosing to cover this case, you can hit on the following talking points of interest.

1. There has been a well-funded propaganda campaign of misinformation to attempt to mislead the public and legislators about the true nature of these crimes, these offenders, and their punishments. Actually the crimes in these cases are simply horrible - among the worst in the history of the United States. And the devastated victims families and communities left behind deserve justice and safety. The true stories of the crimes and the offenders should be told.

2. There is a serious danger posed to all legal long term sentences of incarceration for seriously violent offenders in the United States if the Supreme Court were to accept the argument being made by attorneys for Graham and Sullivan. They are asking the Supreme Court to tear down a long-standing and strong "brick wall" of precedent that has never allowed the 8th amendment to be applied to mere terms of incarceration.

3. The 8th amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment has always only ever been applied to torture and the execution of the mentally ill and those under age 18. (Once historically in the 1800s it was also applied to someone being stripped of their U.S. citizenship for a more minor offense.) If the Supreme Court breaks this serious precedent, it opens up a legal standard called "proportionality" that could allow judges anywhere to ignore state law about what punishment should go with a crime set in law. It could potentially provide a whole new and bizarre precedent for legal reasoning that would allow a judge to simply say, "this long sentence that the state requires does not feel proportional to me - you look like a nice kid. I'm only going to give you 10 years."

4. Potentially then, a Supreme Court ruling in favor of Graham and Sullivan could therefore be a violation of states rights. The Constitution in the 9th and 10th amendments clearly spells out that states are to set the laws as to crime, incarceration and punishment for all except a very few federal offenses that cross state boundaries.

5. Offender advocates have been lying about international law and standard, reporting frequently that the USA is the only nation in the world to incarcerate violent teens for life. This is not true. 11 countries, including Australia, do. And some do far worse - they allow children and teens to be sold into prostitution and slavery, and they allow torture and other horrible forms of mutilation to children. The US record on treatment of juvenile offenders is actually a generally good one.

6, Offender advocates argue we should comply with an international treaty that the USA has never been a signatory to - the International Treaty on the Rights of the Child. We cannot be held to be in violation of a treaty we never signed. And again, our human rights record is far better for treatment of juvenile offenders over all than many nations.

7. Lives in prison still allow offenders to have a life of potential meaning and contribution. They can mature, learn, offer service to others, and make restitution to their victims, all from their prison cells. Many states allow them to marry, some to have conjugal visits. Many offer advanced educational opportunities. They can write and publish books and art. They can be creative. They can mentor other troubled youth and offenders. They can be rehabilitated. They can worship. They can redeem themselves. And all these things, they should do. While serving their life sentences.

They are getting far more opportunities than they ever gave their victims.

Does life without parole for minors who didn't kill constitute cruel and unusual punishment?

While we commend the high profile attention that the Chicago Tribune continues to give to this issue, Mr. Savage's article missed some basic fact checks.

First, the United States is NOT the only nation to sentence juveniles in rare and very violent crimes to long term or life sentences. It is one of 11, including Australia.

Second, there are not 2500 cases. This original estimate from Human Rights groups has since been discredited by an actual count done by the Heritage Foundation after talking to states around the nation. The number is more likely just above 1100. The sentence remains extremely rare and used, with little exception, in the "worst of the worst" cases.

Finally, this one-sided article takes up the propaganda line of the defense attorneys for Sullivan and Graham, who are asking the Supreme Court in their briefs to break firm and long standing precedents. The 8th Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment have never been applied to mere incarceration. And it is the pervue of states to define crimes and their associated punishments. To broach these principles legally could have potentially chaotic impact on the nation's legal system. Regardless of what the Court decides on the Sullivan and Graham cases, we believe they can not rule broadly.

Your article is supposed to be objective and researched. It clearly is not. It is impossible, not improbable and not unusual .... impossible, for Terrance Graham to be given a life without parole sentence for a robbery followed by a �home break in�. There is no law in Florida or anywhere in the United States that allows for such a penalty.

You can check with Roy Black (Kennedy-Smith�s lawyer) in Florida or any of the criminal defense lawyers there, they will verify this.

A review of the briefs in the case show that there was a lot more to the Graham crimes than you wrote.

Graham�s first conviction was for an �armed burglary� that included an �assault� (threat to harm) or �battery� (actual harm). He was given a one year sentence for this even though it carried a potential life sentence.

Upon release his next crime was planned against a vulnerable family. The State of Florida brief reads:

"A month shy of his eighteenth birthday, Graham led older accomplices in planning and then committing an armed robbery at the home of Carlos Rodriguez Lopez, a recent war refugee from Colombia who worked as a construction laborer and lived with his wife and stepson."

The crime was a home invasion robbery not a �home break in� as your wrote. Three men forced their way into the Rodriguez-Lopez house with guns. They held guns to Mr. Rodriguez� head and demanded money. They stayed in the house for half an hour before leaving.

After this robbery the group attempted yet another armed robbery. In this robbery, one of Mr. Graham�s crime partners was shot. Graham fled from police after dropping his partner off at the hospital. He sped through residential streets at speeds up to 90 miles per hour.

When he was apprehended, Graham confessed to engaging in other robberies as well.

Contrary to what your article claims, Graham did not receive Life Without Parole following a one day hearing. There was a series of hearings to determine whether Graham had violated the conditions of his release on the original charges. His sentencing exposure for violating this conditions ranged from 66.75 months of incarceration up to a life sentence. He refused to admit guilt to any crime other than eluding the police, showed no remorse and received the maximum sentence. The judge cited his danger to society as the main motivating factor.

Contrary to the implication in your article, �Incorrigible� was not the legal basis for the sentence.

It is certainly appropriate to debate the reasonableness of Mr. Graham�s sentence. In fact, the Supreme Court is entertaining just such a debate. However the public debate needs to be informed by facts. We rely upon the LA Times and reporters to be accurate and complete.

I am sorry but your story reads like an advertisement for one side. Even the appellate briefs of Mr. Graham are more balanced.

California NOVJL member whose husband and three children were murdered, and she was stabbed and left for dead but survived, is having to face a new sentencing hearing by her niece, who along with her boyfriend, committed this horrible quintuple homicide and assault. Sylvia, we are sending you our prayers of support!

Comment by Jen

November 12th, 2008

Jen wrote:

Accordingly, in the absence of a constitutional prohibition against the imposition of a life sentence without the possibility of release, the wisdom of this sentencing scheme remains with the legislature.

That is a complete punt. And the lazy man�s way out.

Comment by Gideon

It is, in a sense. But not having seen the brief, I don�t know how well the argument was presented. Seems like a throwaway with the heavy reliance on Roper.

I�m just not sure this presented the proper opportunity to hold that LWOP violates 8th Amendment. Further, I do think that hands were tied with sole reliance on Fed Constitution.

Maybe if there was a claim under the State Constitution, more thought would have been given.

Comment by Jennifer Subscribed to comments via email

November 16th, 2008

The key word here is �mandatory� transfers to adult court. The advocates for the under age 18 killers (most of whom are incredibly guilty of very heinous aggravated and cold, calculated multiple murders or murder rapes � and most of whom were 17 � likely have appropriately earned life sentences) should concentrate their efforts on the mandatory nature of these transfers. The victims families of these cases are under assault � they need to be found, notified, and supported to be a part of this public policy debate. Please see our website at http://www.jlwopvictims.org.

The National Organization of Victims of Juvenile Lifers
NOVJL

a public defender

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