May 17 (Bloomberg) -- Youths can’t be sentenced to life in prison without parole unless they are convicted of murder, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a decision that may mean shorter jail terms for scores of inmates. The ruling, which split the court along ideological lines, extends a 2005 decision that outlawed the execution of murderers who were under 18 at the time of the crime. Both cases concerned the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
“A state need not guarantee the offender eventual release, but if it imposes a sentence of life it must provide him or her with some realistic opportunity to obtain release before the end of that term,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for five of the six justices in the majority.
Today’s ruling will have its biggest impact in Florida. That state houses 77 of the 111 juveniles who have been sentenced to life without parole for a crime other than murder, according to a study cited by lawyers challenging the practice.
Today’s ruling came in the case of Terrance Jamar Graham, who was found to have violated his probation by taking part in an armed robbery at the age of 17.
Four justices -- John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor -- joined Kennedy’s opinion. A sixth, Chief Justice John Roberts, said that, while he agreed with the outcome of the Graham case, he would not have imposed a categorical ban on such sentences.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito dissented.
Less Culpable
In the 2005 case, a 5-4 decision, Kennedy wrote that those under 18 are generally less mature and more susceptible to peer pressure than adults. “Juvenile offenders cannot with reliability be classified among the worst offenders,” he wrote.
The Supreme Court has said the central question under the Constitution’s cruel and unusual punishments clause is whether a “national consensus” exists against a sentence in particular circumstances. High Court Limits Youth Life-Without-Parole Sentences (Update1)
The justices today separately dismissed the appeal of Joe Harris Sullivan, who was convicted of raping a 72-year-old woman when he was 13. Sullivan was convicted in 1989 and sentenced to life without parole, and one issue in his case was whether he waited too long to press his constitutional argument.
The cases are Graham v. Florida, 08-7412, and Sullivan v. Florida, 08-7621.
