Supremes Strike Down Death Penalty for Juveniles

[lady cop]

the US Supreme Court this morning has ruled unconstitutional the death penalty for anyone who committed their crimes before age 18. this affects 70 people on death row now, including lee malveaux, the sniper. there were four dissenting opinions.

[lady cop]

Young Killer Who Threw Woman In River Hails Death Penalty Ruling

Victim Taken From Home, Tied Up, Thrown Into River



POSTED: 12:12 pm EST March 2, 2005


WASHINGTON -- Eight months has made a lifetime of difference for Christopher Simmons.

Because Simmons was that many months shy of his 18th birthday when he tossed a woman to her death off a railroad trestle, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that he cannot be executed for the murder.

The ruling in Simmons' case also spared the life of 72 death row inmates across the nation who were younger than 18 when they committed murder and bars states from seeking to execute minors for future crimes.

[Beth]

None the less, I still agree with the decision.

http://www.abanet.org/crimjust/juvjus/simmons.html

EXECUTING JUVENILE OFFENDERS RUNS COUNTER TO BASIC AMERICAN STANDARDS OF DECENCY AND FAIRNESS
The execution of a juvenile offender is contrary to fundamental principles of American justice which punishes according to the degree of culpability and reserves the death penalty for the "worst of the worst" offenders. By their very nature, teenagers are less mature, and therefore less culpable, than adults who commit similar acts but have no such explanation for their conduct. Adolescence is a transitional period of life when cognitive abilities, emotions, judgment, impulse control, and identity are still developing.

Indeed, immaturity is the reason we do not allow those under eighteen to assume the major responsibilities of adulthood such as military combat service, voting, entering into contracts, drinking alcohol or making medical decisions. A number of organizations including the American Bar Association, the Child Welfare League of America, the Children's Defense Fund, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the American Society for Adolescent Psychiatry, the American Psychiatric Association, and the National Mental Health Association have taken a stand against the juvenile death penalty.

In April 2002, Indiana became the latest state to abolish the juvenile death penalty, raising the total number of states that bar the execution of juvenile offenders to 28. Sixteen states and the District of Columbia now bar the execution of juvenile offenders by law and twelve states do not have capital punishment. If one adds the number of states which are now considering, or have recently considered, bills to raise the eligibility age for the death penalty to age eighteen, including Missouri, Texas (a bill passed the House), Florida (a bill passed unanimously the Senate), Nevada, Arizona, Kentucky, and Mississippi, it is clear that a consensus is emerging against the execution of juvenile offenders.

In the Midwest, a region that is not as supportive of capital punishment as other regions of the country, evolving standards of decency decry the use of the death penalty against juvenile offenders. A recent survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center found that only 31.5 % of Midwesterners support using the death penalty against juvenile offenders. Now that Indiana has repealed its juvenile death penalty, Missouri is the lone Midwestern state with the juvenile death penalty on its statute books.

EXECUTING JUVENILE OFFENDERS IS CONTRARY TO INTERNATIONAL LAW

In continuing to execute juvenile offenders, the United States acts in defiance of substantial international consensus and law. Indeed, such executions have all but ended around the world, except in the United States. In the last decade, the United States has executed more juvenile offenders than all the world's nations combined. Since 1990, only seven countries are reported to have executed prisoners who were under 18 years of age at the time of the crime: The Democratic Republic of Congo, Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the United States. The nations of Pakistan, and Yemen have since abolished the juvenile death penalty, while Saudi Arabia and Nigeria deny that they have executed juvenile offenders.

In the last three years the number of nations that execute juvenile offenders has dwindled to only three: Iran, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the United States. Moreover, just this past year, Iran stated that it no longer executes juvenile offenders while the leader of the Democratic Republic of Congo commuted the death sentences of four juvenile offenders.

The death penalty for juvenile offenders is expressly prohibited by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), and the American Convention of Human Rights. While the United States has not yet ratified the CRC and specifically reserved its right to execute juveniles when ratifying the ICCPR, the execution of Christopher Simmons would further alienate the United States from the international community. Moreover, it would further damage our legitimacy as a world leader in the protection and promotion of human rights, particularly the rights of children.

[Beth]

http://www.missourinet.com/CapitalPu...ons_christ.htm

This tells of the murder Simmons commited.

[lady cop]

i knew you would disagree my friend , but there may well be some interesting discussion here, death penalty questions with the additional factor of age.

[Beth]

Originally Posted by lady cop

i knew you would disagree my friend , but there may well be some interesting discussion here, death penalty questions with the additional factor of age.

I agree. I just don't like getting too involved with this type of discussion, I can get overly emotional in them. Simmons did a very bad thing, horrible, unspeakable, but I am not sure his mind was in the same mentality of a Bundy-type. I get conflicted over a sense of vengence and a sense of what I see as fair and just. I can better understand a seasoned and mature serial killer being executed than I can someone who commits crimes as a kid.

When I was a teenager, I had wierd ideas and distorted reality, nothing homicidal or harmful to others, but things that now embarrass me and make me realize that even though I appeared to be all there, I was a little messed up at times.

[lady cop]

you're right Beth, this is one conversation that tends to become passsionate and heated .

[Der Wulf]

Does this mean that a murder committed by a teenager causes less harm to the victims loved ones, than one committed by an adult ? Shall we slide further down this slope and decide that anyone committing murder must be out of their mind, and therefor exempt from the death penalty?

The mind's of teenagers are by definition immature, they are however, from about 3 yrs. old , capable of understanding right from wrong.

[BabyRider]

Originally Posted by Beth

I I can better understand a seasoned and mature serial killer being executed than I can someone who commits crimes as a kid.

If you use Malveaux as an example for this, wouldn't he be very much like a serial killer? I have always had a problem with the line being drawn at a certain birthday. If a kids kills 5 people at 11:30pm the night before his 18th birthday, he is not subject to the death penalty, but if he commits exactly the same crime 31 minutes later he is? If only it were possible to take each single case into consideration individually. Each person is different, each crime is different, but when the laws governing the punishment are written in such a way as to allow ANYONE under 18 to get away with murder, something is wrong. It's a very touchy subject, and I'm sure it's about to cause some very heated discussion here.

[Beth]

I don't even think Malveaux was a seasoned killer. He was under the influence of his older, father figure lover. Also, imprisoning a murder, under the age of 18 is not allowing them to get away with murder.

I wonder, is the death penalty truly legal justice, or is it legal vengeance for the family?