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STOP THE 2010 Four Bill ASSAULT in the Michigan Legislature Contact these legislators!
Barbara P Hernandez is Michigan inmate # 218771. She murdered a brother named Jimmy of NOVJL board member Jody Robinson. The hearing is tentatively scheduled for March 15th in Jackson Michigan.
She has lied about the facts of her own involvement, and is now, of
course, trying to minimize her role in a brutal stabbing. She has now
changed her story, and well-meaning advocates such as the ACLU have
published her lies: that she was hiding in the kitchen while an abusive
boyfriend actually did the horrible crime. The State of Michigan should not give her clemency. Please write to tell them so. Address for the Michigan Parole and Clemency Board:
Here is a list of the 13
1] Richard Musselman was
15 when he and a co-defendant drove to
2] Henry Hill Jr. and
Dennis Lee Johnson were convicted for the First Degree Murder of Anthony
Thomas which occurred on 7/16/80 and were sentenced to life without parole
in prison on 6/3/80. As I indicated in my earlier e mail, both Hill and
Johnson and two others chased Anthony Thomas in Veteran’s Memorial Park in
Saginaw and shot 15 times at him, wounding him in the back and head
causing him to fall to the ground where he was executed by a final shot
from co-defendant adult Larnell Johnson. All were African American men as
was the victim. Hill was 16 as was Johnson.
3] Michael Jackson, 16,
beat his grandmother to death when she wouldn’t give him money for his
drug addition.
4] Dexter Tolliver was
15 when was convicted by a jury of First Degree Murder in 1984 and
sentenced on 1/15/86 to life without parole. He was African American.
District Judge Christopher Boyd was the Prosecutor. He is currently
incarcerated in Ionia Maximum Prison.
5] I became the
prosecutor in 1989 and tried Michael Perry, 16. He was convicted by a jury
of 3 counts of First Degree Murder, Arson and 3 counts of Attempted
Murder. He and a 13 year old co-defendant threw firebombs into the home of
Willie and Cynthia Rollie at 4am and killed 3 of their children, an 11
year old daughter, a 9 year old daughter and 7 year old son Issac who was
burned beyond recognition when he was overcome by smoke and flames on the
stairway trying to flee the burning house. Mr. and Mrs. Rollie and their
remaining 12 year old son, jumped from 2nd floor windows or
they would have died too. Willie sustained 3rd degree burns and
scars on his body when he went back inside to try to rescue Nicole,
Demetra and Issac. The Rollie children were African American and Michael
Perry was white. Perry was sentenced to life without parole on 6/27/91
while the 13 year old co-defendant was tried as a juvenile, the only
option in 1991, convicted and released after detention.
6] Willie Debardelaben,
15, was convicted by a jury of 2 counts of First Degree Murder, B & E
Occupied Dwelling and Felony Firearm Possession for killing 2 African
American men in a house robbery. He also murdered a Hispanic male before
that case was solved because the victim would not give him a cigarette
outside a local bar. He was on juvenile probation at that time for sodomy
of a 6 year old neighborhood child when he killed these 3 men.
Debardelaben was 6’2” 200# and also African American. He was sentenced to
life without parole in 1994 for the two First Degree Murders and to life
on his conviction for Second Degree Murder in 1993.
7] Deon Haynes, 16, shot
and killed a 15 year old girl in her home when Haynes and accomplices
committed a home robbery. The victim recognized Haynes in spite of his
mask, called out his name and Haynes shot her to death. The victim’s
younger brother spent years trying to commit crimes that would land him in
prison so he could find Haynes in prison and kill him to avenge his
sister’s death. The victim was white. Haynes is African American.
8 I also co-tried
Shytour Williams, 15, for killing 18 year old MSU coed Karen King along
with his parolee cousin August Williams in 1997. Karen King was home over
Christmas to visit her parents who lived next to
9] On 12/16/97 Elliot
Whittington, 16, robbed and killed 2 elderly African Americans in their
car in the city. He was convicted by a jury of 2 counts of Premeditated
First Degree Murder/Felony First Degree Murder, Armed Robbery, Felony
Firearm Possession and Conspiracy to commit First Degree Murder with his
18 year old accomplice and sentenced to life without parole. He is also
African American.
10] On 4/12/98 Oliver
Webb IV, age 16, drove to his victim Tommy Ford’s home and took Ford to a
city cemetery at gunpoint, made Ford kneel next to a gravestone and beg to
live, then shot him dead and left him hidden in the cemetery. Webb later
returned to the body and cut out the victim’s teeth to try to prevent
identification of the body and actually encouraged his dog to eat the
flesh of the deceased to cover the murder up. The victim’s mother Barbara
Clark testified along with her son and daughter at the House Judiciary
Committee meeting in May that she opposed any parole for Webb even though
she forgave him for murdering her son. Mrs. Clark and all parties
including the Defendant and victim are African American. Webb was mad at
Tommy Ford over a girlfriend.
The
Only 33 of the current
159 convicted juvenile First Degree Murderers committed their killings
after 1998 when the new law giving prosecutors discretion to waive over
juvenile murderers to adult court without a Phase 2 waiver hearing in
Probate court first. In
11] Deondre Gaines
committed his First Degree Murder on 1/3/08 and was sentenced to life
without parole. He and other gang members had stalked victims throughout
the night. He was sentenced on 11/8.06. He was convicted of First Degree
Murder, Conspiracy to Murder, 2 counts of Assault with intent to Murder,
Felony Firearm Possession and Carrying a concealed weapon. He was 16.
12] Dequavious Johnson
was convicted and sentenced on 5/15/08 for killing a 14 month old baby
girl in a car seat in a car occupied by the intended gang target of
Johnson. In a car driven by his gang members to a drive by shooting,
Johnson aimed at a 300 # rival in the car and missed but hit the baby
between the eyes. In addition to Conspiracy to commit Murder and
Premeditated First Degree Murder, Johnson was convicted of 2 counts of
Assault with intent to Murder, Carrying a Concealed weapon, 2 counts
Discharging a weapon from a vehicle and 7 counts of Felony Firearm
Possession. The baby was African American as were the other four co
–defendants and victims. Johnson was 16.
The important point to
PRESS COVERAGE - Michigan Associated Press LANSING, Mich. (AP) _ Michigan inmates locked up with mandatory life sentences for crimes committed before they turned 17 would get a chance at parole under legislation that triggered emotional testimony Wednesday in a packed House committee. Supporters wore yellow T-shirts that stated, "Save the Children, Vote Second Chance." Opponents such as victims' families described horrific crimes committed by teens. "Young people can be saved, not all of them," said Rep. Bert Johnson, a Highland Park Democrat and sponsor of one of the bills. "Some young people can in fact be saved." But Greg King, whose daughter Karen was kidnapped from a grocery store, raped and murdered in Saginaw County in 1997 while home for the holidays from Michigan State University, opposed giving the parole board an opportunity to free one of her killers. "Criminals need to know, no matter how old they are, they will be punished to the full extent of the law," King said as his wife, Linda, wiped away tears. Karen King's killers were a 15-year-old and his 25-year-old cousin who had been released on parole. Michigan does not allow parole for juveniles tried as adults and convicted of premeditated murder or felony murder _ a killing committed during the commission of a felony. The legislation would give current inmates who committed their offenses before age 17 parole eligibility after serving 15 years. The parole board would not have to release them, though. Future offenders under 17 also could no longer get life with no chance of parole under the bills. The Democratic-led House Judiciary Committee is expected to vote May 27 after hearing more testimony on that date. Similar legislation was passed by the House late last legislative session but is expected to hit opposition in the Republican-controlled Senate if it clears the House this time around. On one side of the debate Wednesday were groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan along with relatives of juvenile offenders serving mandatory life without parole. On the other side were victims' families and prosecutors. Advocates said juveniles are not as mature as adults but unfairly receive the same punishment for crimes committed before they are old enough to vote. Michigan is one of 11 states to automatically consider 17-year-olds adults for criminal purposes. Paul Stankewitz, public policy associate for the Michigan Catholic Conference, said juveniles should at least get a chance later in life to prove they are worthy of release. "Michigan is failing to promote genuine rehabilitation," he said. Jennifer Bishop-Jenkins, a co-founder of the National Organization of Victims of Juvenile Lifers, said the legislation has re-traumatized victims' families who were promised the perpetrators would never be freed. She said the criminals still get to live and see their loved ones who visit them in prison. Victims "don't get second chances," said Bishop-Jenkins, whose sister, her sister's husband and their baby were killed by a 16-year-old in Illinois in 1990. She said lawmakers should focus on prospective measures and not make proposals that would be retroactive and disrupt the lives of victims' families. She noted that Gov. Jennifer Granholm already has the power to commute a life sentence. A 2005 study by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International showed Michigan had the second-highest rate of imposing life sentences without parole on juveniles. Michigan has at least 158 prisoners sentenced to life without parole for crimes committed before they turned 17, according to ACLU research. At least 32 were sentenced for felony murder regardless of whether they pulled the trigger, leading critics to argue there is not enough case-by-case flexibility for children tried as adults." OTHER STORIES AT: http://apps.detnews.com/apps/forums/newstalk/lettersindex.php?relatedURL=http://www.detnews.com/article/20090601/OPINION01/906010332/Judicial+discretion http://www.detnews.com/article/20090601/OPINION01/906010332/Judicial+discretion http://www.freep.com/article/201002280300/NEWS03/2280457 http://www.freep.com/article/201002280300/NEWS03/2280458 http://www.freep.com/article/20100301/OPINION01/3010322/1322/Repeal-Michigans-juvenile-lifer-law
OpEd/Letter Submitted to Detroit Free Press by NOVJL ED NOTE: A reporter from the Detroit Free Press has led the paper's "campaign" against JLWOP - a seeming violation of journalistic objectivity - but explained by the fact that his brother is a JLWOP incarcerated offender. We submitted this to them in the hopes that they might publish something from the victim perspective. If the paper does not publish this, we will express concern in a more public fashion about the questionable "agenda" by this major newspaper. I searched Jeff Gerritt’s piecee (May 3) on juvenile life without parole in vain for the word “victim.” No luck. The word “victim” was absent, as was any mention of the victims of the crimes that resulted in life without parole sentences. These crimes had victims. Each victim had a family, people left devastated in the wake of the brutalization of their loved ones. Now Gerritt proposes that innocent victims and their families be stripped of the justice and finality they were promised and forced to undergo parole hearings every two years for the rest of their lives or the rest of the perpetrator’s life, unless the thing those families fear most happens: the criminal is let out on the streets. Perpetrators of brutal crimes chose the consequence of life without parole when they chose to prey on the innocent. Victims of those predators did not choose their fate; it was foisted upon them. That is why victims and the perpetrators of the crimes against them are inextricably linked. You cannot change the sentences of one without affecting the other. Which brings us to justice and morality. Is it just to trade the life sentence of a violent offender and impose it instead on innocent victims and their families, sentencing them to parole hearings where they relive the crime over and over? Is it moral to even consider retroactively changing sentences in serious violent crimes without ensuring that all victims and their families have been given notice and an opportunity to be heard? Gerritt tells the tale of one convicted murderer. I can match him in horror stories. Imagine you are Jody Robinson of White Lake, Michigan. You’re 18 years old and ready to celebrate your senior prom and high school graduation. Instead, your life is frozen in grief when your big brother Jimmy is killed on his way to buying your mom a Mother’s Day card. He is stabbed so many times that he is nearly decapitated. Jody Robinson doesn’t want the murderers who slashed her brother to death to have a second chance to kill. Neither should the rest of us."
Human Rights Watch urges Senate to pass Bill already passed in the Michigan House in Dec 2008 requiring victims families to go through a lifetime of constant parole hearings, retroactively changing the Life Without Parole sentences given to the offenders in their case - Victims Families not notified of the bill: http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2008/12/09/us-michigan-moves-end-life-without-parole-juveniles The ACLU report issued on Dec 2008 Michigan House passage of bill banning JLWOP and transferring the life sentences instead to victims families through never ending parole hearings. Now on to their Senate - victims families not informed or included! http://www.aclumich.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=607
IMMEDIATE
RELEASE:
LANSING – The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan
applauded the State House of Representatives today for passing a package of
bills (HB 4402 –HB 4405) that would prohibit the sentencing of juveniles to
life in prison without the possibility of parole. There are currently more
than 300 individuals serving mandatory life sentences for crimes they
committed as children. The Senate may take up the bills as early as next week.
"The House recognizes that we can't afford to continue sending children to adult prison for life. This is the first step of many to correct the injustices of Michigan’s juvenile justice system,” said Kary L. Moss, ACLU of Michigan Executive Director. “This package of bills is not a ‘get out of jail free card’ -- It simply aims to make these child offenders eligible for parole consideration and allows judges to use discretion when deciding what type of punishment best fits the crime.”
In January,
the ACLU of Michigan along with the Michigan Catholic Conference and dozens of
juvenile justice supporters testified at a House Judiciary Committee meeting
urging members to support this package of bills. All juvenile offenders in Michigan are serving their time in adult prisons and neither the juries that heard their cases, nor the judges who issued their sentences, had any discretion to mete out lesser sentences. These types of sentences exist in 43 states, but five states – Michigan, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, Florida and California account for two-thirds of the imprisoned youth. Michigan, however, takes the law a step further and requires that juveniles convicted of “felony murder” be sentenced to life without parole even if they did not commit the crime themselves, but were merely present when someone was murdered.
In its recent “shadow report” to the United Nations’ Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the ACLU cites Michigan’s mandatory sentencing of youthful offenders to adult prison without the possibility of parole as an example of the pervasive institutionalized, systemic and structural racism in America. The 215 page report, Race & Ethnicity in America: Turning a Blind Eye to Injustice, claims that an overwhelming majority of those sentenced are minorities; 69 percent are African American, although African Americans account for only 15 percent of Michigan’s youth population.
Michigan residents appear to be ready for changes to these sentencing laws. According to a state-wide poll conducted by the Wayne State University Center for Urban Studies, 72 percent of respondents said they believed adolescents under the age of 18 who commit violent offences are strong candidates for rehabilitation. In addition, recent research recognized by the Supreme Court in its opinion prohibiting the death penalty for juveniles, casts doubts on the cognitive capacity of teens to understand the criminal consequences for their actions and their ability to understand the judicial system or cooperate in their own defense.
In 2004, the ACLU of Michigan released their report, “Second Chances,” which calls attention to these policies. Legislation to correct these laws was introduced in Lansing a year after the report was published. In 2006, a report released by the United Nations Human Rights Committee expressed “concern” over state laws that allow juvenile offenders to be incarcerated for life and asked the U.S. to ensure that no juvenile is sentenced to life without parole.
To read about a few of the young men and women who are currently serving “life without parole” sentences in Michigan prisons, go to: http://www.aclumich.org/modules.php?name=ExtraNews&file=article&sid=37
To read “Second Chances”, go to: www.aclumich.org/pubs/juvenilelifers.pdf
A copy of the ACLU’s report on the U.S. government’s report to CERD can be found online at: http://www.aclu.org/cerd
From HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH for Michigan: Senate Committee Should Approve Historic Bills Passed by House
(Washington, DC, December 9, 2008) - Michigan's Senate Judiciary
Committee should approve four bills abolishing life sentences without
parole for juveniles in the state, Human Rights Watch said today in a
letter to the committee. The practice is cruel, inappropriate,
discriminatory, and a violation of human rights, Human Rights Watch
said.
"Michigan has 321 young offenders sentenced to die in prison," said Alison Parker, deputy director of the US Program of Human Rights Watch. "Last week, the House rejected the notion that juveniles are beyond redemption. If these bills pass the Senate, they may be able to earn a chance at freedom." On December 4, Michigan's 110-seat House of Representatives voted to pass the bills, by margins ranging from 12 to 61 votes, and the bills now move to the Senate. Michigan joins California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Nebraska, and the federal government in taking steps toward ending the sentence of life without parole for offenders under age 18. In a 2008 update to a series of reports on the sentencing of youth to life without parole, Human Rights Watch reported that Michigan's population of youth serving the sentence is the third-highest in the country, just behind Louisiana and Pennsylvania. There are no youth serving the sentence in the rest of the world. "Michigan and certain other states in the United States stand alone in locking up kids and throwing away the key," Parker said. "Not a single other country in the world incarcerates offenders under 18 for life without providing them some chance of demonstrating rehabilitation and remorse." In its letter, Human Rights Watch noted that both brain science research and the 2005 Supreme Court case of Roper v. Simmons recognize that some child offenders have the capacity to turn their lives around even after committing a heinous crime. Acknowledging the suffering of victims and their families because of youth crime, the letter points out that many youth serving life without parole did not physically commit the crime for which they were sentenced. Nearly half of youth sentenced to life without parole surveyed in Michigan were sentenced for aiding and abetting or for an unplanned killing in the course of a felony. Human Rights Watch also highlighted the racial disparities in sentencing. In Michigan, black youth are serving life without parole at a per capita rate 10 times higher than that of white youth. Two UN oversight and enforcement bodies, the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, have found that the practice of sentencing juveniles to life without parole violates US human rights treaty obligations. Letter to Michigan's Senate Judiciary Committee
Senator Wayne Kuipers, Chair
Senate Committee on the Judiciary P.O. Box 30036 Lansing, MI 48909-7536 Fax: (517) 373-2751 December 9, 2008 Dear Chairman Kuipers and Members of the Judiciary Committee: Human Rights Watch urges Michigan's Senate Judiciary Committee to vote in favor of Senate Bills 6, 9, 28, and 40, which will abolish the sentence of life without parole for juvenile offenders in your state. We oppose life without parole for juveniles because it is cruel, inappropriate (particularly given recent scientific research), imposed disproportionately on black youth, and a violation of international law. Human Rights Watch has been analyzing the issue of life without parole sentences for juveniles since 2004. Our most recent publication on this issue, released in 2008, The Rest of Their Lives: 2008 updated findings published in The Rest of Their Lives: Life Without Parole for Child Offenders in the United States (a 2005 report on juveniles sentenced to life without parole throughout the United States).[1] Based on our research, we urge the Committee to vote in favor of Bills 6, 9, 28, and 40 for three main reasons. First, the decision to sentence a juvenile to life without the possibility of parole is a decision to sentence that young person to die in prison. There is no time off for good behavior, no opportunity to prove that he has become a different person, responded with remorse, and chosen a path of rehabilitation. Next to the death penalty, there is no harsher condemnation, no clearer judgment by our society that this is a life to be thrown away. In Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 561 (2005), the US Supreme Court found that the differences between juveniles and adults render suspect any conclusion that a juvenile offender can be judged beyond rehabilitation at such a young age. Neuroscience reveals that the process of cognitive brain development, including the formation of impulse control and decision-making skills, continues into early adulthood-well beyond age 18. The fact that juveniles are still developing their identity and ability to think and plan ahead means that even a heinous crime committed by a juvenile is not "evidence of an irretrievably depraved character."[2] Research by Human Rights Watch and others has revealed that often youth sentenced to life without parole were not the primary actors in the crime: they did not pull the trigger; they did not physically commit the crime. Nearly half of youth sentenced to life without parole surveyed in Michigan were sentenced for aiding and abetting or for an unplanned murder in the course of a felony.[3] In 45 percent of California cases surveyed, youth sentenced to life without parole had not actually committed a murder and were convicted for their role in aiding and abetting or participating in a felony.[4] These are all cases in which someone else was the primary actor. A significant number of these cases involved an attempted crime gone awry-a tragically botched robbery attempt, for example-rather than premeditated murder. Moreover, Human Rights Watch estimates that 59 percent of the youth serving life without parole in the United States received this sentence for their very first offense-they had no juvenile or adult criminal record whatsoever prior to the offense that resulted in their life sentence. We also estimate that 26 percent of the youth serving the sentence of life without parole in the United States received it for aiding and abetting or felony murder. Second, we urge you to vote in favor of Bills 6, 9, 28, and 40 because we are deeply concerned that racial discrimination enters into the determination of which youth receive life without parole sentences, and which youth enjoy the possibility of release. In Michigan, racial disparities in sentencing practices raise serious concerns: African-American youth are serving life without parole sentences at a rate that is ten times higher than that of Caucasian youth.[5] Third, the US practice of sentencing youth to life without parole violates international law. International law prohibits life without parole sentences for those who commit their crimes before the age of 18, a prohibition that is universally observed outside of the United States. Oversight and enforcement bodies for two treaties to which the United States is a party (the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination) have found the practice of sentencing juvenile offenders to life without parole to be a clear violation of US treaty obligations. The United States is the world's worst human rights violator in terms of sentencing juvenile offenders to life without parole. There are currently 2,500 persons serving the sentence of juvenile life without parole in the United States; as of February 2008, to our knowledge, not a single youth is serving this sentence anywhere else in the rest of the world. Within the United States, Michigan has the third largest number of juveniles serving this extremely punitive sentence, falling just behind Louisiana and Pennsylvania.[6] Juveniles can and do commit terrible crimes. When they do, they should be held accountable and face appropriate consequences. Children are different from adults, however, and the punishment imposed for their offenses should reflect their age and level of development. At a minimum, laws should preserve the opportunity for parole for juvenile offenders, and the ability to review whether someone sentenced to life in prison as a child has been rehabilitated. For the foregoing reasons, Human Rights Watch urges Michigan to make its laws more just and eliminate the sentence of life without parole for children by passing Bills 6, 9, 28, and 40. Thank you for your consideration, and please feel free to contact me if I can provide you with any further information. Sincerely, Alison Parker Deputy Director, US Program cc: Senators Cropsey, Sanborn, Patterson, Stamas, Clarke, and Prusi
[1] We have also published Thrown Away (a 2005 report on life without parole for juveniles in Colorado) and When I Die They'll Send Me Home (a 2008 report on life without parole for juveniles in California). [2] Ibid. p. 570. [3] American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan, "Second Chances, Juveniles Serving Life without Parole in Michigan's Prisons," 2004, http://www.aclumich.org/pubs/juvenilelifers.pdf (accessed September 2, 2008), p. 4. [4] Human Rights Watch, When I Die, They'll Send Me Home: Youth Sentenced to Life without Parole in California, January 2008, http://www.hrw.org/reports/2008/us0108/, p. 21. [5] Human Rights Watch, The Rest of Their Lives: 2008, May 2008, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/us1005execsum.pdf, p. 6. [6] Human Rights Watch, The Rest of Their Lives: 2008, May 2008, http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/us1005execsum.pdf, p. 3.
Children facing life
First-degree murder means life behind bars, regardless of age
Life without parole. If it sounds unpleasant, downright harsh, it's supposed
to. In Michigan, where the death penalty was banned in 1846, the mandatory
punishment for a fi rst-degree murder conviction is life in prison without
the possibility of parol No matter how old one is, that's a long time
because there is no hope for release, unless a governor is willing to risk
political backlash and commute the sentence - an almost impossible hope.
But for teenagers who are not yet considered adults, is life in prison without parole a reasonable punishment? Oakland County's history over the past four decades is fairly rich on this issue. One state senator, citing a study that found Michigan to be among the top states with such offenders, is pushing a bill that would ban life-without-parole sentences for offenders under ag 18. Right now, a 17-year-old is an adult in the eyes of Michigan's criminal code. In Oakland County, many youths have been charged with first-degree murder, some in cas that stunned the community, others in cases that quietly moved through the courts. Some have avoided life withou parole. But 40 others are in prison now, serving life without parole crimes committed in Oakland County before they were 18 - of 313 such offenders in Michigan prisons. All 40 committed firstdegree murder. Today, these men and women range in age from 19 to 61. Some, such as Nathaniel Abraham, Michael Conat and Brandon Carnell, avoided the life-without-parole term because they were sentenced as juveniles or convicted of lesser charges. Forty others, such as Joseph Passeno and Bruce Micheals, who kidnapped and killed a Rochester Hills couple in order to access their ATM accounts in 1989, were convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced as adults to life in prison, where they sit today. Tough-on-crime laws were passed in the late 1980s and mid-1990s because of highly publicized violent crimes. Of the 40 Oakland County offenders, 25 committed their crimes within a decade, between 1987 and 1996. And today, three adolescents currently are charged with murder and face life without parole in Oakland County Circuit Court. In all three cases, the alleged violence is chilling. One is accused of stabbing his mother to death; one is said to have fired a gun into a car in a gang-related incident; and one allegedly returned to the scene of a carjacking with the intent of killing the victim, David Lee Bingham, a 38-year-old father of two, who was shot four times. Two of the three were 15 at the time of their alleged crimes; one was 17. Do young killers, if convicted of first-degree murder, deserve a second chance because of their ages? State leaders will have to determine what is too young to be sentenced to prison for life. Proposed change State Sen. Liz Brater, DAnn Arbor, said young offenders deserve consideration for a second chance, not a guaranteed way out of prison, and she would do that by banning life-without-parole sentences for offenders under 18. "Basically, they were children at the time when they committed their offense," Brater said. "We acknowledge they committed severe crimes. We believe they should get a second chance. We believe at some time in their lives, they should go before the parole board." A recent study by Amnesty International and the Human Rights Watch revealed that Michigan ranked second among states with offenders under 18 who were sentenced to life without parole. Several states, though, such as Texas and New York, do not have such sentences. Nationwide, at least 2,225 life-without-parole inmates were under 18 when they convicted their crimes, according to the Amnesty and Human Rights study. This study and another by the American Civil Liberties Union showcase individual cases in which life without parole seems harsh. Some offenders did not do the actual killing, and others came from abusive homes. As Michigan's get-tough-oncrime legislation of the 1990s becomes an expensive burden on the state, lawmakers have sensed that public fear of rampant violent crime has shifted to decrying prison expenses, especially as education spending and revenue sharing with municipalities have shrunk. Brater cited a recent Wayne State University poll that showed the public favors not locking young murderers away forever, as 72 percent of those polled believed violent offenders under 18 are strong candidates for rehabilitation. "I'm not saying release everybody automatically," Brater said. "All we're asking with this legislation is, TTake another look.' This has to be looked at on a case-by-case basis, and that's what parole boards do. They deserve a second chance." Oakland County Prosecutor David Gorcyca does not want a complete ban on life without parole, calling it a "tool in his arsenal to fight crime." "I don't think it should be used in every case, but I certainly would like it as a tool to protect the public," Gorcyca said of life without parole as a sentence. Right now, for a first-degree murder conviction, the law mandates a life-withoutparole sentence. One option might be to return authority to judges to impose the sentence if they see fit and not tie their hands. Gruesome history A look back at the 40 cases from Oakland County reveals that even an affluent area cannot avoid violent bloodshed. These cases showcase both gruesome cruelty and pure coldbloodedness. Some are revolting, with children stabbed to death; others are stunning in the slight amounts for which victims died. Michael Kvam, who was 17 when he and another man raped and killed a woman, a teenager and a little girl in Avon Township, now Rochester Hills, in 1984, shook one judge enough to change his stance on the death penalty. And Sean Sword was 17 when he shot and killed a man working in a Rochester Hills party store in 1994, ending a string of armed robberies. Sword testified at his trial that he didn't like the tone of the victim, who told him the store was being closed: "The way he said it ... I just pulled out the gun." Several of the offenders fi t the profile of one who Brater said might deserve a second chance, coming from broken or abusive homes and having mental problems. Anthony Bonelli's attorney, James Andary, said the then-17-year-old had "slipped through the cracks" and should have been institutionalized when he drowned a girl who had been his friend in Orchard Lake in 1989. Robert Charles Cook, who was 17 in 1969, claimed that voices told him to climb onto a roof and shoot at people when he killed a motorcyclist. And several of the cases feature participants who did not do the actual killing, though they helped cover up the crimes and shared in the stolen rewards. Some of these cases include: Barbara Hernandez, then 16, watched as her 20-year-old boyfriend cut a man's throat and stabbed him 25 times so they could steal his car. Jennifer Pruitt, who was 17, watched as her 23-year-old girlfriend stabbed an elderly man 27 times - after they had returned to his home a second time, having already stolen $93, cigarettes and other items. John Polick was 16 when, during a break-in, he shined the flashlight on a 67-year-old woman as his elder brother beat her so badly that she later died. Polick helped steal a television from the woman's Waterford Township home. Both brothers were sentenced to life. All of these cases feature one shared quality, which is why prosecutors believed they belonged in prison for the rest of their lives. For these killers, life was cheap. But in Oakland County, generally, these offenders' rights were well-protected. Intense legal battles While poor legal representation sometimes leads to overturned convictions, the cases from Oakland County tend to feature top lawyers. Prominent defense attorneys such as Larry Kaluzny, Mitchell Ribitwer and Jerome Sabbota tried some of the cases. The late James S. Thorburn, who later served as a circuit judge known to challenge prosecutors, helped represent the county's oldest teenage offender still in prison, Sheldry Topp, who stabbed a county attorney to death in 1962. Perhaps the biggest legal fight involved a teenager who shot somebody just because he didn't have a match to light his cigarette. In 1980, Ronnie C. Waters, then 17 and with a group of friends acting tough at the Miracle Mile Drive-In theater in Bloomfi eld Township, fi red a handgun into a car, injuring a Clarkston man and killing his wife, 28-year-old Deborah Ann Porcelli. Waters was defended by one of Oakland County's top lawyers, the late William Waterman, who went on to sit on the 50th District Court bench and recently had Pontiac's district court building named after him. Waterman argued that the shooting was "compulsive, inexplicable, ridiculous" and deserved a second-degree murder charge with a chance at parole. A district judge agreed, but then-Prosecutor L. Brooks Patterson successfully countered that it was a "coldblooded execution," and two circuit judges and the state's higher courts agreed. With the first-degree charge holding up, Waters will not get out of prison without a governor's signature - as the law stands now. Given a break Other teenage killers from Oakland County were given a break, even in some of the most notorious cases. Michael Anthony Conat, now 23, shot his younger sister to death in Rochester Hills at age 16. After a lengthy debate, he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to at least 25 years in prison. Brandon Carnell, who was 14 when he killed his parents and sister in his Springfi eld Township home in 1988, was sentenced as a juvenile and held until he was 19. Since then, he has rebuilt a life without crime and is married and deeply involved with his church. Ribitwer, who represented Carnell, said the mandatory nature of life-without-parole sentences is the problem when it comes to juveniles. "It's something that should be discretionary for the judges," said Ribitwer, who now is defending a boy who was 15 when he allegedly stabbed his mother in Rochester Hills. Pointing to the success of Carnell, Ribitwer said: "The problem is the Legislature has authorized prosecutors to decide if a 15- or 16-year-old child will be charged as an adult. The system puts a tremendous amount of discretion into the hands of the prosecutor," who represent one side of the issue. Previously, prosecutors petitioned the court to charge a juvenile as an adult, and a dozen different criteria were examined in detail before a judge made the decision. Ribitwer said judges, who stand as the neutral party in a case, should have the authority. But even judges must weigh the potential political disaster of giving a teenager a break and having him or her kill again. A blown second chance One case highlighted the fears that judges, prosecutors and legislators feel when deciding to give someone a second chance. In 1987, Donyelle Black was a teenage terror awaiting a tragic ending. At age 15, he and another boy raped Wanda Sutherland, 39, repeatedly and, ignoring her many pleas for mercy, killed her. She was shot three times in a wooded area near her apartment off Orchard Lake Road in Pontiac on July 14, 1987, by Black, whose life of crime started at age 11 and included drugs, theft and assaults. The boy had pulled her from her car at gunpoint after he and the friend, 14-year-old Calvin Hirsch, decided to rob someone. After they raped, robbed and beat her, Black then shot her in the head, Hirsch later testifi ed. While Black received life in prison upon his conviction, Hirsch pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced as a juvenile. He served five years and was released at age 19. "There's nothing worse than watching someone walk down the hallway because you can't keep them anymore," said Deborah Carley, chief deputy prosecutor in Oakland County. "It's not fair to the victims and it's not fair to the community." In 1996, at age 23, Hirsch shot a couple over a $13 drug debt owed by someone else. The man was injured and his 35-year-old fiancee, Dora Lisa Shaw, was killed. A friend of hers owed Hirsch the $13. Hirsch finally was sentenced to life in prison. "With two homicides to his credit in the past 10 years, Calvin Hirsch has dug his own grave," said Assistant Oakland County Prosecutor John Pietrofesa at the time. "We just put him in it. Prison did nothing to rehabilitate him." Whether incarceration can save a young offender is the question remaining with the county's youngest killer. A killer at 11 Nathaniel Abraham, the area's most infamous young killer, was 11 when he shot 19-year-old Ronnie Green Jr. in 1997 in Pontiac. He will soon be freed because he was sentenced as a juvenile by Oakland County Probate Judge Eugene Arthur Moore. No matter what, Abraham will be released in 14 months, and the judge, social workers and prosecutors have closely monitored his progress at the W.J. Maxey Boys' Training School near Ann Arbor. Abraham, who turns 20 in January, wants to go to a halfway house for his last year of custody. He is to be in court Monday for a regular review hearing, a public examination into whether a child killer can be rehabilitated. "He is the reason why we should have life in prison without parole," said Carley, who regularly presses social workers and state offi cials to present all information on Abraham's status, which has been marred by problems, including assaults, slow progress and a recent investigation into whether he fathered the child of a worker there. DNA tests showed he wasn't the father. One woman hates seeing the continued stories about Abraham, finding the attention paid to him with such a public upbringing hurtful instead of helpful. Flawed system? Betty Montgomery, 67, of Pontiac said she fears racism is at root for making laws so tough for young offenders, many of whom are black and come from urban areas. While Oakland County ranks second in the state with the 40 young offenders sentenced to life, Wayne County is on top of the list with 123, according to the ACLU study. "Our system hasn't made it any better," she said, believing the state's resources lack quality. But too often, she said, young men fall victim to circumstances and lose their lives with one bad decision. "These are young people," Montgomery said. "They never got a chance to display their abilities. They get into drugs and they are gone. We don't have adequate programs in Oakland County for kids who are at risk with problems." Carley, the chief deputy prosecutor, appreciates the questions society must ask as it blends public safety with properly considering the circumstances of each case. Easy answers are impossible with this issue, and solutions cannot cover every case. Carley said prosecutors do not take lightly their role in charging a juvenile as an adult. "They are very, very difficult," Carley said. "You need to look at each case individually." But she said life without parole has served as a deterrent, knowing that their ages will not prevent them from the full punishment society has to offer. Currently in court Three teenagers younger than 18 are in Oakland County courts and charged with murder. Christopher Dankovich was 15 and a freshman at Rochester Adams High School when charged with stabbing his mother 111 times in their Rochester Hills home on the night of April 24 or morning of April 25. Now 16, he is expected in court Tuesday for a preliminary exam. Charged with open murder, a jury could convict him of either first-degree or second-degree murder. Xiong Pheng, an accused gang member, was 15 when he allegedly fired a gun into a car after a Hmong wedding ceremony, killing Yang Chong, 17, on May 28. His fi rstdegree murder trial is scheduled for February. And Christopher Eugene Jackson, who was 17, is accused of being the triggerman in a case that shook even veteran cops who had seen it all. After carjacking David Bingham's pickup truck, Jackson and his co-defendant, Cordarrel Landrum, are accused of driving around the block, returning to the Pontiac gas station and then executing Bingham as he spoke to police dispatchers. Jackson is due in court for a pretrial hearing on Wednesday. Landrum, now 19, was 18 at the time of the shooting. Police believe he knew Jackson was going to shoot Bingham, and prosecutors believe both are equally responsible and are both charged with fi rst-degree murder. The prosecutor handling this case said the proposed change in the law would be "monumentally ironic" and not serve justice. "It would be ironic if the actual shooter gets some kind of reduced sentence and the getaway driver has to go to prison for the rest of his life," said Assistant Oakland County Prosecutor John Skrzynski. "He (Jackson) is the one who they actually see doing the deed. That was such a coldblooded thing. He allegedly returned to the scene to execute this guy. He came back to eliminate him as a witness. "It's hard to explain to a grieving family that the actual murderer doesn't have to pay the same price as the getaway driver. It wouldn't make sense to them, and it wouldn't make sense to anybody else." One brother's opinion And for the brother of David Bingham, such a change in the law would not be right. "Anybody who commits a heinous crime like this was supposedly done, I think you should pay the highest price for what you've done," said Terry Bingham of Shelby Township. "I think you know what you're doing when you're 17 years old. If you're man enough to have sex with somebody, you're man enough to know what you're doing." David Bingham visited his brother's home three or four times a week for laughs and hanging out. "It's a void in my life," said Terry Bingham, adding that the pain his family now feels will never go away. "His sense of humor was one of a kind. An hour with him, and I'd need about 10 minutes by myself to calm down. He was always happy about something. Even when he was kind of upset, he always tried to make a joke about it." On July 5, David Bingham stopped for gas on his way to work. Terry Bingham said he always thinks of his brother's two children, ages 10 and 14, who have lost their father. "With a heinous crime, like murder or rape, you don't give them a second chance, because they are sick people," Terry Bingham said. "We don't need people like that on the streets." Cost of security? Carley agrees with Terry Bingham, that murderers do not belong free in society. "If life in prison without the possibility of parole is a great enough deterrent, maybe it's the right thing," said Carley, who was hired as a prosecutor on the day of Glenn and Wanda Tarr's slaying in 1989, a day she remembers vividly because of the shock at the two fresh-faced teenagers who kidnapped and killed them. Today, the faces of Joseph Passeno and Bruce Micheals show a life spent in prison, with Passeno's numerous facial tattoos most striking. Brater, though, believes that throwing away the key may be the wrong answer in every cases, partially because of the expense. She said one out of every $5 in the state's general fund goes to prisons, and that number has to be reduced - a difficult task with such tough sentencing laws. "We do have to look at the possibility of rehabilitation," Brater said. Barbara Levine, of the Citizens Alliance of Prisons and Public Spending, said the 1983 state budget saw only 5 percent of the general fund go to corrections. Tough-oncrime laws have pushed that to 20 percent with $1.8 billion spent on prisons from Michigan's general fund. "Crime rates have been falling pretty steadily since the early 1980s," Levine said. "Crime is directly infl uenced by the economy." And the state leaders must acknowledge that teenage killers lack the maturity and impulse control of adults, she said. Also, her organization has said that once these offenders hit their 30s or 40s, they are the least likely to re-offend when released. "To just throw them (juveniles) away ... and to tell them there is no chance of being rehabilitated, it is not civilized," Levine said. "It is not what most of the world does." According to the Human Rights study, only Israel, Tanzania and South Africa have such juvenile offenders serving life without parole. "It is a waste of life and resources, and it is not necessary to keep the public safe," Levine said. "I think the budget is going to be the driving factor in this." First-degree facts First-degree murder is the only crime that features a sentence of mandatory life in prison without parole. First-degree murder can be charged in two ways: premeditated murder or felony murder. Felony murder is a homicide that occurs during the commission of a selected number of felonies. Typically, it involves armed robbery, but it can also come from child abuse, arson or rape. Premeditation involves planning and it can take seconds or days. Instead at looking at the time, jurors consider whether a man or woman had time to reconsider their actions.
JEFF GERRITT Granholm must now deliver prison reformsFebruary 14, 2008 By JEFF GERRITT FREE PRESS EDITORIAL WRITER Michigan's packed prison system is bankrupting the state, economically and morally. If Gov. Jennifer Granholm, midway through her second term, is looking for a legacy, here it is: Start to bring the prison population, now the size of Battle Creek, down to where it serves justice and the taxpayer. Enable Michigan eventually to spend hundreds of millions of dollars more each year for smoother roads, better universities and more police officers. A former prosecutor wary of getting a soft-on-crime tag, Granholm finally appears ready to roll on prison reform. She knows the state can no longer afford to spend $2 billion year -- that's $5 million a day or 20% of the state's general fund -- and get so little in return. Today, one in three state civil service employees works for Corrections; in 1980, one in 20 did. The Michigan Department of Corrections has had some success controlling its prison population in the last three years. Still, with more than 50,000 inmates, the population is more than three times what it was 25 years ago. In her State of the State address, Granholm suggested adopting corrections policies similar to other Midwestern states that manage to spend less money than Michigan without compromising public safety. It's not a radical idea. Some of the state's top business leaders have embraced it. On average, Michigan incarcerates at a 40% higher rate than the seven other Great Lakes states, which also report lower crime rates. Bringing Michigan's incarceration rate down to similar levels would save $400 million a year, maybe more. Some efforts will take bills passed by the Legislature. Others, like releasing more parole-eligible inmates, will not. But all will take courage and aggressive leadership -- something Granholm has, up to now, failed to deliver on prison issues. As governor and party leader, she needs to step up and push necessary changes. The state's budget crisis has handed her an opportunity. The state must finally enact sentencing reforms that divert more low-level offenders into community programs. It must broaden the eligibility for boot camps, expand prisoner re-entry programs to reduce recidivism, grant parole hearings to parole-eligible lifers, treat more mentally ill offenders in the community, and release more severely sick or dying inmates who pose no risk. Near the top of Granholm's agenda should be repealing Michigan's notorious juvenile lifer law, which has rightly drawn fire from human rights groups worldwide. The law has forced judges to give kids as young as 14 -- an age when they can't legally drive or buy cigarettes -- the maximum adult penalty of life without parole in first-degree murder cases. More than 300 Michigan inmates are serving such sentences -- some, like Barbara Hernandez, for aiding and abetting murder. Hernandez, now 33 and locked up in the Robert Scott Correctional Facility in Plymouth, was 16 when her 20-year-old boyfriend, James Hyde, killed a man she brought into an abandoned house where they stayed. In 1991, the Pontiac teenager got the same sentence as Hyde: life without possibility of parole. Hernandez had no prior record. She left home when she was 14 because of ongoing physical and sexual abuse by her father and stepfather. Hyde beat her regularly and forced her to prostitute to support his drug habit. On May 12, 1990, Hyde told her to bring the victim, James Cotaling, 28, into the house so that he could rob him. Hernandez, who said she was in another room when the stabbing occurred, said she had no idea Hyde would kill him. "Sometimes I wish he would have killed me, instead," Hernandez told me Tuesday. "That man (Cotaling) mattered to people. I didn't. No one would have missed me." All in all, I'm not sure what the right sentence would have been for Hernandez -- she has already done nearly 20 years. But just throwing away the key and, with it, even the possibility of a second chance for this 16-year-old was obscene. Granholm needs to take a hard look at some of these cases and get some fire in her for doing the right thing -- for everyone in Michigan. The governor should find a surprising amount of support for most of the reforms, including from clear-eyed businesspeople such as Rich Studley, vice president of the Michigan Chamber of Commerce. He asked more than a year ago: "Why is it that Michigan, compared to other states, puts more people in prison for longer periods of time for no difference in crime rates or recidivism?" In conversations with me on restructuring government, Richard Blouse, president and CEO of the Detroit Regional Chamber, and Doug Rothwell, president of Detroit Renaissance, have raised similar concerns. Granholm can listen to those who continue to support the failed corrections and criminal justice policies of the past. Or she can carve a legacy of justice for herself and Michigan that will protect its citizens, save public money, and get Michigan off the international list of human rights violators. Nothing she can do in her final years as governor would matter more. JEFF GERRITT is a Free Press editorial writer. Contact him at gerritt@freepress.com or 313-222-6585.
Michigan State University's Library Resource page on Juvenile Justice and JLWOP articles
Heroic Michigan Prosecutor Sues Michigan Department of Corrections NOVJL commends one of the finest prosecutors we know - Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper. She has consistently stood with us for victims rights to notification and to be at the table in discussions about proposed reforms to the JLWOP sentence. She has gone above and beyond to help murder victims family members. And now she takes a powerfully important action step in wake of the state's budget downturn and its impact on prisons:
DOWNLOAD THIS LIST OF ALL JLWOP OFFENDERS IN MICHIGAN and help us find their victims families!
PARTIAL LIST OF MICHIGAN JLWOP OFFENDERS with links to their personal stories
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