Posted on 10/29/2009 6:35:26 AM PDT by La Lydia
It did not take long for the judge to determine that the convicted rapist in front of him was irredeemable. "He is beyond help," Judge Nicholas Geeker said of Joe Harris Sullivan. "I'm going to try to send him away for as long as I can." And then Geeker sentenced Sullivan to life in prison without the possibility of parole. At the time, Sullivan was 13 years old.
Now, 20 years after that sentencing in a courtroom in Pensacola, Fla., the Supreme Court will consider whether Sullivan's prison term -- and what his supporters say is an only-in-America phenomenon of extreme sentences for juveniles -- violates the Constitution's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.
The case -- which has drawn widespread notice and briefs from former senator Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) and others describing their own youthful crimes -- is likely to be a cardinal criminal justice decision for the court this term. It is a natural outgrowth of the court's bitterly divided ruling in 2005 that juveniles cannot be executed for murders they commit...
Sullivan, who his lawyer said had been living on the streets since he was 10, had a troubled history with the law. He had 17 offenses before the crime at issue. In 1989, he and two friends burglarized the home of a 72-year-old woman one day while she was away, then returned later. The woman was raped by one of the juveniles; she never saw his face, identifying him only as a "dark, colored boy." But she remembered that he said something like, "If you can't identify me, I may not have to kill you."...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Alan Simpson committed youthful crimes? Does that include rape?
Sometimes you just have to shake your head and wonder: “What the Hell are these people thinking?”
“Justices will scrutinize life sentences for youths”
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So glad, warm and fuzzy feeling now that I’ve see that here!
Made me realize just how unfair it is.
In a peeg’s @ss!!!!!
The article doesn’t say that the perp raped the 72 year old woman, but I’ll agree with you that whoever did it deserves to be put away for life.
The perp was convicted to raping a 72 year old woman. His defense lawyer, surprise, wonders if he is guilty, but a jury has determined that he is guilty.
A link to Alan Simpson’s Post oped on his own youthful crimes, which did not include rape. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/22/AR2009102203803.html
My thoughts exactly!
Alan, go away and play some golf. Leave justice to those with the stomach for it.
it isn’t fair that the boy should be forced to sit in a cell for 60+ years waiting for his eventual death.
just wall up his cell now and forget about him.
I have met a woman who does in home rehabilitation on children who commit murders. She uses some pretty extreme therapeutic techniques. I do believe in redemption but 20 years in prison isn’t going to rehabilitate someone.
What type of extreme therapeutic techniques does she use? I, too, believe in redemption, but I also believe in protecting the innocent in our society from natural born predators. Better 20-30 years in prison with no rehabilitation than more victims.
Carrying rocks around in her back yard and holding therapy come to mind. Don’t know details.
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