Juvenile Life Without Parole

The US remains the only nation to sentence children to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Approximately 2,500 youths are serving this sentence, some of them for non-homicide offenses. As the public increasingly recognizes the inhumanity of treating adolescents as adults in the application of criminal laws and penalties, the campaign to eliminate youth sentences of life without parole has grown.

There is growing public awareness that is it unjust to hold juvenile offenders to the same standard of blame as adults. Scientific research shows that youth do not have the same capacity as adults to use reasoned, mature judgment, or to control impulsive behavior. Newspaper editorials across the nation increasingly embrace the notion that “[c]hildren, even really bad ones, are different from adults” and should be treated differently in criminal sentencing because “they haven’t yet developed an adult’s brainpower, resistance to peer pressure, judgment, and thus moral capacity” (LA Times editorial, April 30, 2009).

NCYL has been a part of this movement, intensifying its work in California and the national arena over the past year. NCYL’s efforts include:

• Playing a key role in creating a National Campaign Coordinator position for the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth, which helps advocates push for state and federal legislation to eliminate life without parole sentences for youth 
• Co-sponsoring California Senate Bill SB 9, which would provide the opportunity for youth serving life without parole to reduce their sentences 
• Supporting Graham v. Florida, a US Supreme Court case that ruled it unconstitutional to sentence youth to life without parole for non-homicide crimes