EFTA01159891

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.Greg Brown's Weekend Reading and Other Things.... 09/07/2014 
Sun, 07 Sep 2014 23:02:23 +0000 
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2i Percent in 20 Years Middle Class Wealth Is Evaporating_Samuel_Becker_August_ 
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to do is stay_andjeam —Th; Guardian August_21,_I014.docx; 
th;_Fice:This Time Bob— lietivrt Huff—Post Aug._20,_2014.docx; 
The Lives of TJuvende Lders_Ashley_Nellis:The_Sentencing_Project-
Marh 20I2 
31_2014.pdf; 
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liam_Boott TV7P_Aug.10,_2014.docx; 
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9,_2514.docx; Bank_Land_oral Jefey_Hel ler —Iteuters_Aug.:31,_1014.docx; 
Ukraine_ Deal Imposes_Truce_P—utin_Devised_ciElL_MacFARQUHAR_NYT_Sept._5,_20 
14.docx 
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DEAR FRIEND 
,Kenneth Young's Case 
Web Link for the show's trailer: http://www.pbs.org/pov/15tolife/ 
A friend send me the trailer of the PBS documentary on POV - /5 to Life: Kenneth's Story —
which is about a 14-year-old Kenneth Young who with 24-year-old Jacques Bethea, a neighborhood 
crack dealer and Young's mother's supplier, committed a series of armed robberies in Tampa, Florida 
in June 2002. Bethea brandished the pistol and on one occasion was talked out of raping one of the 
victims by his younger partner. Fortunately, no one was killed or seriously injured during the crimes. 
And at the age of 15, Young was tried under Florida law as an adult and received four consecutive life 
sentences without the possibility of parole. By 2006, all of Young's appeals had been denied. In 2009, 
his last hope for clemency from the governor's office was also denied. Then, in 2010, the U.S. Supreme 
Court's ruling in Graham v. Florida declared it unconstitutional to sentence a juvenile to life in prison 
without the possibility of parole in the case of non-homicidal crimes. This ruling vacated Young's life-
without-parole sentences. At his 2011 re-sentencing hearing at the age of 26, Young was resentenced 
to four concurrent 30-year terms, followed by 10 years of probation. Kenneth Young is set for release 
in 2030 and continues to seek a reduced sentence that acknowledges his rehabilitation. 
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Having been in a supermarket being robbed by a bunch of young toughs, it is an ugly experience. But 
you can't watch Kenneth's story and wonder why no one in our criminal and courts systems in Florida 
felt any compassion for this young man, giving the cards that he was dealt with as a child. I grew up in 
a neighborhood where some of my teenage friends were seduced into crimes by older siblings, friends 
of the family, other family members or the local street toughs. These were often the only role models 
that they had and often they really didn't understand the consequences of their actions. While at the 
same time "Sammy the Bull" Gravano, the enforcer for Mafia Godfather John Gotti, who acknowledged 
killing 19 people himself was given only a five year prison sentence and then placed in witness 
protection in Arizona. Which one do you think is more dangerous? There are lost souls who are and 
will always be a danger to society. And some of them are teenagers and even younger. But to give a 
fifteen year old four consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole for something that he 
did when he was 14 years old and there was no loss of live or bodily harm is not justice in anyway 
shape or form. 
It is evident that injustice still exist in our legal system and the unspoken clear disparity is in the cases 
where the young are Black and Hispanic. Yes there were people mentally, emotionally, and maybe 
even physically hurt during this spree but no one was killed. Did he deserve some punishment of 
course, but 4 life sentences come on. More importantly, we know that that our jails and prisons are 
criminal colleges, so putting a teenager into an institution with murders, rapist, career criminals and 
other violent offenders is not going to lead to any type of rehabilitation, especially when he or she 
realizes (or being told) that this is where they will be for the remainder of their life. Again, I grew up in 
a neighborhood where many of my peers had little to no chance, as they were schooled in criminal 
enterprise by the adults around them, while my mother hoped that church and school along with a 
copious amount of corporal punishment would keep me on the right track. But if my mother had been 
a crack whore, I might have followed her crack dealer boyfriend on a criminal spree. So there but for 
the grace of God go I. And for kids like Kenneth Young, shouldn't we live in a society that is 
compassionate enough to try to redeem them instead of putting them in holes and throwing away the 
keys. The United States is the only country that sentences junivels to Life Without Parole and since 
the late 199os more than 2500 juveniles have been sentenced to Life Without the Possibility of Parole. 
This is an outrage 
THE LIVES OF JUVENILE LIFERS I FINDINGS FROM A 
NATIONAL SURVEY 
Ashley Nair:, Ph.D.: March 2012 
The United States stands alone worldwide in imposing sentences of life without parole on juveniles. 
The U.S. achieved this unique position by slowly and steadily dismantling founding principles of the 
juvenile justice system. Today a record number of people are serving juvenile life without parole 
(JLWOP) sentences in the U.S. for crimes committed before their 18th birthday. 
Sentences of life without parole are often erroneously believed to translate to a handful of years in 
prison followed by inevitable release. The reality is that a life without parole sentence means that the 
individual will die in prison. 
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This report provides a new perspective on the population of individuals serving life sentences without 
parole for crimes committed in their youth. It represents the findings of a comprehensive 
investigation into this population that includes the first-ever national survey of juvenile lifers. 
Through this effort we obtained in-depth information from these individuals about their life 
experiences prior to their conviction, as well as descriptions of their lives while incarcerated. The 
findings are sobering, and should become an element of policy discussion regarding this extreme 
punishment. 
KEY FINDINGS 
Although it does not excuse their crimes, most people sent to prison for life as youth were failed by 
systems that are intended to protect children. Survey findings from 1,579 individuals around the 
country who are serving these sentences demonstrate high rates of socioeconomic disadvantage, 
extreme racial disparities in the imposition of these punishments, sentences frequently imposed 
without judicial discretion, and counterproductive corrections policies that thwart efforts at 
rehabilitation. Highlights of this report include the following: 
Socioeconomic Disadvantages, Education Failure, & Abuse 
Juvenile lifers experienced high levels of exposure to violence in their homes and 
communities 
• • 
79% of individuals reported witnessing violence in their homes; 
• • 
More than half (54.1%) witnessed weekly violence in their neighborhoods. 
Juvenile lifers, particularly girls, suffered high rates of abuse 
• • 
Nearly half (46.9%) experienced physical abuse, including 79.5% of girls; 
• • 
77.3% of girls reported histories of sexual abuse; overall, 20.5% of juvenile lifers report being 
victims of sexual abuse. 
Juvenile lifers generally experienced significant social and economic disadvantage in 
their homes and communities 
• • A third (31.5%) of juvenile lifers were raised in public housing; 
• • 
Eighteen percent (17.9%) of the respondents were not living with a close adult relative just 
before their incarceration; some reported being homeless, living with friends, or being housed in 
a detention facility, treatment center, or group home. 
Juvenile lifers faced significant educational challenges 
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• • Two in five respondents had been enrolled in special education classes; 
• • 
Fewer than half (46.6%) of these individuals had been attending school at the time of their 
offense; 
• • The vast majority (84.4%) of juvenile lifers had been suspended or expelled from school at 
some point in their academic career. 
Extreme Racial Disparities in JLWOP Sentences 
The racial dynamics of victims and offenders may play a key role in determining which 
offenders are sentenced to juvenile life without parole 
• • The proportion of African Americans serving JLWOP sentences for the killing of a white 
person (43.4%) is nearly twice the rate at which African American juveniles are arrested for 
taking a white person's life (23.2%); 
• • 
Conversely, white juvenile offenders with black victims are only about half as likely (3.6%) to 
receive a JLWOP sentence as their proportion of arrests for killing blacks (6.4%). 
JLWOP Sentences Frequently Imposed Mandatorily 
The majority of JLWOP sentences are imposed in states in which judges are obligated to 
sentence individuals without consideration of any factors relating to a juvenile's age or 
life circumstances 
• • States such as Pennsylvania, which holds the nation's largest population of juvenile lifers, 
require that youth of any age charged with homicide be tried in adult court and, upon conviction, 
sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. 
Corrections Policies Curtail Efforts at Rehabilitation 
Most (61.9%) juvenile lifers are not engaged in programming in prison, but this is 
generally not due to lack of interest, but because of state or prison policies 
• • Among the juvenile lifers who were not participating in programming, 32.7% had been 
prohibited because they will never be released from prison; an additional 28.9% were in prisons 
without sufficient programming or had completed all available programming. 
Many juvenile lifers are engaged in constructive change during their incarceration when 
they are permitted the opportunity to do so 
• • Two-thirds have attained a high school diploma or GED; 
• • 
Despite long distances from home and family, many juvenile lifers attempt to maintain close 
ties with loved ones through phone calls, letters, and visits; 
• • 
As years in prison pass, lifers are charged with declining numbers of disciplinary actions. 
Web Link: http://senteneingprojeeLorpjdoe/publicationsth The Lives of Juvenile Lifers.pdf 
For the entire report download from the above web link and it is attached. 
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RECOMMENDATIONS FOR REFORM 
Public safety is compromised when at-risk youth are not provided with adequate, evidence-based, 
early intervention and violence prevention programming. As a society we can invest early in the lives of 
high-risk youth to provide skills and support and thus alter the pathways that lead to crime. Waiting 
until a young person commits a serious violent crime before positively intervening in his or her life is 
both cruel and misguided. Instead of immersion in evidence-based prevention and early intervention 
programming to offset their risk factors, for too many individuals, their first formal "intervention" is a 
life-without-parole sentence. 
The seriousness of the crimes committed by these individuals cannot be dismissed. All juvenile lifers 
were convicted of serious crimes and usually a life has been lost. Family members of victims have had 
a terrible injustice done to them and their lives are forever changed. There is little support for victims 
in the criminal justice system in terms of healing from the loss and compensating for the harms done; 
surviving family members are frequently left out of the justice process despite how intimately they are 
involved in the offense that occurred. 
Eliminate Juvenile Life Without Parole (JLWOP) 
Enactment of laws that allowed for lifelong prison sentences occurred in the absence of comprehensive 
review, expertise, and careful weighing of the consequences of a juvenile life-without-parole sentence. 
We are not aware of a single hearing at the state or federal level on the appropriateness of JLWOP 
until recent years; some juvenile lifers had already been imprisoned for decades before the 
appropriateness of this sentence for youth offenders was brought into question. Only a handful of 
studies on the matter have been produced. Responses to some of the questions that have now emerged 
suggest that these questions ought to have been considered long before thousands of lives were forever 
changed by a sentence that would fate them to die in prison. It is far too simple to pass harmful 
criminal justice policies and far too difficult to undo them once the damage is realized. 
Eliminating juvenile life without parole would not result in serious, violent offenders escaping 
punishment. Instead, this would involve adoption of punishments proportionate to the crime while 
considering an offender's age, maturity, and capacity for personal transformation through 
rehabilitation. The imposition of sentences that deny any hope for release contradicts what we know 
about young people's potential for change. There is a wide gap between the view that some youthful 
offenders deserve stiff punishment and the perspective that no juvenile, under any circumstance, 
should ever be afforded the opportunity to seek release from imprisonment. 
Allow and Encourage Life-Sentenced Inmates to Engage in Rehabilitation Programming 
Rehabilitation programming in prison is often reduced in corrections budgets in times of fiscal 
constraints, despite the reality that 93% of prisoners return home. For life-sentenced inmates, the 
opportunities for rehabilitation are even slimmer; the limited number of available slots are generally 
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reserved for those who will be released the soonest, so lifers are consistently pushed to the back of the 
line, if they are permitted to engage in programming at all. This is especially problematic for juveniles 
with life sentences, as their sentences are, by definition, longer than most. Many youth whose life 
sentences were determined to be unconstitutional in 2010 under the Graham v. Florida ruling now 
face challenges in demonstrating reform in order to be considered for release, as some have been 
denied the opportunity for programming because of their life sentences. This poses a challenge to the 
Supreme Court's requirement that, "What the State must do, however, is give defendants...some 
meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation." 
House Youth in Age-Appropriate Settings Pre-Trial and Post-Conviction 
To the extent that some youth will continue to be transferred to adult court and processed as if they 
were adults, this does not mean that they need to be housed with older, adult offenders and have their 
lives put in danger on a daily basis because of their physical and psychological vulnerabilities. Instead, 
youth placed in the adult system should be housed separately from adults and commingling should be 
prohibited. Ideally, youth serving long sentences should be placed in juvenile detention centers until 
their early 20s before being transferred to an adult facility. 
Address Racial Disparities 
Racial and ethnic disparities observed at this stage of the system are greater than elsewhere in the 
spectrum of sanctions for juveniles who commit crime. While some disparity might be explained by 
differential treatment in the justice system, we also know that since a high proportion of juvenile lifers 
are from poor, high-violence neighborhoods, this can contribute to higher rates of involvement in 
serious crime. 
Greater investment in prevention and early intervention strategies in high-need communities would 
result in lower incidences of life sentences for juveniles. In addition, closer inspection of the racial 
dynamics between offenders and their victim(s) in lengthy sentences including JLWOP sentences may 
reveal unwarranted racial disparity in sentence imposition. Though most of the attention on this topic 
is devoted to death sentences, there is good reason to expand such analysis to other death-in-prison 
sentences. Building on evidence from death penalty research, analysis of racial dynamics between 
offender and victim in the allocation of JLWOP sentences, both retrospective and prospective, will 
allow better understanding about how sentences are applied. 
Invest in Prevention, Not Warehousing 
Instead of spending scarce resources on warehousing lives that could be transformed, we could be 
spending money more wisely, helping victims, and improving public safety. The nonpartisan American 
Law Institute recommends a "second look" after to years of imprisonment for life-sentenced youth. 59 
Notwithstanding the probability that most prisoners would not be granted release after only to years, 
if even one eligible inmate was determined to be ready for release upon this "second look," this could 
save a typical state $1.8 million in needless incarceration. The money saved could instead be directed 
at prevention and intervention programs that have a strong evidence-base in lowering crime: 
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preschool programs, parenting skills development, multi-systemic therapy, vocational training, 
substance abuse treatment, and a host of other effective interventions that would reduce crime and 
repair families and communities from damage associated with violence. 
As kids we know right from wrong but we do not know the full 
consequences. Please ask people to give us a second chance. 
Juvenile Lifer (severing a life sentence without the possibility of parole) in Michigan 
A Bit of Nostalgia - No words needed 
If you are under 55, you simply 
won't understand. 
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