Within 2 days of the election a Town Hall Meeting was held at Georgetown University entitled “A Call To Action for Juvenile Justice”.  This 2.5 hour conference presented the need for juvenile justice reform in its entirety.  Whether at risk youth, mental health, juvenile delinquency, juvenile incarceration, education, treatment.  The entire gammet of the issue was presented and covered.  This town hall meeting is being used to present a united front of advocacy organizations who are seeking change , to the incoming administration. 

There was an atmosphere of momentum, hope and action throughout the conference.  The committee co-chair was Professor Charles Ogletree (Harvard Law School) who is one of President-elect Obama’s top advisers.   In conjunction with this meeting, advocates were asked to submit reports or summaries of the specific issues they were working on.  Below you will find that document.  We believe that we have turned the corner in this battle and that we will see strong policy changes over the next two years. 

Submission by The Coalition for the Fair Sentencing of Children to the ABA’s Juvenile Justice Committee’s Town Hall Meeting November 6, 2008

Life without Parole for Youth Offenders in the United States in 2008

Youth (persons below the age of 18) can and do commit terrible crimes, causing enormous suffering to victims and their families. When youth commit such crimes, they should be held accountable, but in a manner that reflects their age and immaturity and their special capacity for rehabilitation. Instead, 39 US states and the federal government have tried teens who are too young to vote, buy cigarettes, or serve on the juries they appear before, and have sentenced them to juvenile life without parole (JLWOP). Life without parole means that a young person is sentenced to die in prison.

A sentence of juvenile life without parole is cruel, unfair, and unnecessary. It sends an unequivocal message to youth that they are beyond redemption. It erroneously presumes that allowing youth offenders a parole hearing (which is not a guarantee of release) would fail to protect public safety and be unfair to victims. It also ignores the differences between adults and children—differences we accept as a matter of common sense, and which science fully recognizes.

Recommendations

The United States must stop sentencing youth offenders to life without possibility of parole. Specifically, the Coalition for the Fair Sentencing of Children recommends:

To the Newly Elected President of the United States and the US Congress

                        Abolish the sentence of life without parole for youth charged with violating federal laws. Such legislation should include a retroactivity provision enabling youth offenders currently serving life without parole to have their cases reviewed by a court for re‐assessment and re‐sentencing to a sentence that includes the possibility of parole.

                        Pass HR 4300, or other legislation to condition federal funding of state programs upon the state’s elimination of life without parole sentences for youth offenders.

Life without Parole for Youth: A Nationwide Problem

According to Human Rights Watch:

􀂾 There are currently 2,484 persons in US prisons serving sentences of life without parole for crimes committed when they were under the age of 18.

􀂾 Nationally, black youth are serving life without parole at a per capita rate that is 10 times that of white youth.

􀂾 There are no youth serving JLWOP anywhere else in the world. Four youth serving life without parole sentences in US prisons; the pictures depict each of them within a few months of his or her arrest. They were (from left to right) age seventeen, fourteen, sixteen, and fifteen when they committed their crimes. © 2005 Private.

Youth serving JLWOP across the country are predominantly male (only 2.6 percent are female), and the majority are black (60 percent). Sixteen percent were fifteen or younger when they committed their crimes. Figure 1 (below) gives the state distribution of the 2,484 youth serving JLWOP sentences. In some states, a sentence of JLWOP is mandatory once a youth is convicted of certain crimes; in others, the sentencing judge has discretion. California, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, and Pennsylvania have the largest numbers of youth sentenced to JLWOP, and all but California impose the sentence on a mandatory basis.1

Figure 1 – State Distribution of 2,484 Juvenile Offenders Serving JLWOP2

1 In California, youth convicted of certain categories of murder are presumptively sentenced to JLWOP, since California law states that in such cases youth “shall be” sentenced to JLWOP unless a judge finds “good reason” to instead impose a sentence of 25 years to life.

2 Sources: State prison systems provided data directly to Human Rights Watch as of mid‐2004 (except that HRW used the National Corrections Reporting Program to obtain data for Virginia, and for Alabama, we used its inmate locator system). We updated data between mid‐2004 and 2008 using the following methods: state departments of corrections sent updated data directly to Human Rights Watch or to other organizations; post‐2004 press reports were checked against inmate records with state departments of corrections; and correspondence received by Human Rights Watch from youth offenders sentenced to life without parole was checked against press reports and state inmate records. The term “mandatory” means judges have no option other than to sentence youth offenders to JLWOP upon conviction for at least one type of offense. Most often that offense is first degree murder. State law researched by Human Rights Watch and updated by Connie de la Vega and Michelle Leighton, “Sentencing Our Children to Die in Prison: Global Law and Practice,” University of San Francisco Law Review, Spring 2008.

3 Sources: See Figure 1 above for JLWOP sentencing data. Population data extracted by Human Rights Watch from C. Puzzanchera, T. Finnegan, and W. Kang, National Center for Juvenile Justice, “Easy Access to Juvenile Populations Online: US Census Population Data,” State Population Data with Bridged Race Categories 2004, for ages 14‐17, http://www.ojjdp.ncjrs.gov/ojstatbb/ezapop/ (accessed January 2, 2008). Certain states are not included in the above figure because of insufficient data. The ratios were calculated using rates per 10,000 population of youth age 14‐17 disaggregated by race and state.

Crimes That Can Lead to a Life without Parole Sentence

As youth and adult crime rates rose in the late 1980s and early 1990s, politicians and the public feared they were being besieged by “super‐predators”—youth who repeatedly committed violent offenses. In response, states decided to try youth as adults and to send greater numbers of those convicted to adult prison, some with life without parole sentences. The actual profiles of youth sentenced to JLWOP show how misguided and unnecessary those decisions were.

                        The majority of youth sentenced to life without parole are first offenders. Prior to the crime for which they were sentenced to JLWOP, an estimated 59 percent had neither an adult criminal record nor a juvenile adjudication.

                        An estimated 26 percent of youth offenders were convicted of felony murder. These are crimes in which a teen who commits a non‐homicide felony such as robbery is held responsible for a codefendant’s act of murder that occurs during the course of the felony. State laws often do not require the teen to know that a murder will take place or even that the codefendant is armed.

                        Many teens serving JLWOP committed their crimes with adults. For example, in 70 percent of JLWOP cases in California in which a teen was acting with codefendants, at least one of the codefendants was an adult. And, in an estimated 56 percent of California cases in which a juvenile who received JLWOP had an adult codefendant, the adult received a more lenient sentence than the teen.

Racially Discriminatory Sentencing

Figure 2 – Ratio of Black to White Youth Serving JLWOP Sentences3

0.0010.0020.0030.0040.00South CarolinaNevadaAlabamaMississippiKentuckyLouisianaGeorgiaWashingtonMissouriFloridaArkansasOklahomaIowaMassachusettsMarylandMichianAll States *ArizonaColoradoNorth CarolinaNebraskaIllinoisWisconsinDelawareCaliforniaPennsylvaniaConnecticut

As shown in figure 2 above, on average across the country, black youth are serving life without parole at a per capita rate that is 10 times that of white youth. Many states have racial disparities that are far greater. Among the 26 states with five or more youth offenders serving JLWOP and for which Human Rights Watch had data on race, the highest black to white ratios are in Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and California, where black youth are between 18 and 48 times more likely to be serving a sentence of life without parole than white youth.

Life without Parole and International Human Rights

The global rejection of life without parole for young offenders is overwhelming: The Center For Law and Global Justice at the University of San Francisco, in collaboration with Human Rights Watch, has confirmed that there are no youth offenders serving life without parole sentences anywhere in the rest of the world. In its use of JLWOP sentences for youth, the United States is an international anomaly.

The United States’ practice of sentencing youth to JLWOP is a violation of at least two international treaties to which the United States is party. The Human Rights Committee (the oversight and enforcement body for the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights) has said that “[t]he Committee is of the view that sentencing children to life sentences without parole is of itself not in compliance with article 24(1) of the Covenant.” In addition, in March 2008, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (the oversight and enforcement body for the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination) found that, in light of the racial disparities in the sentencing of youth to JLWOP in the US, “the persistence of such [youth LWOP] sentencing is incompatible with article 5 (a) of the Convention. The Committee therefore recommends that the State party discontinue the use of life sentence without parole against [youth offenders], and review the situation of persons already serving such sentences.”

Fair Sentences for Youth

In the United States, criminal punishment has four goals: rehabilitation, retribution, deterrence, and incapacitation. Sentencing youth to life without parole fails to measure up on all four counts.

After years of ignoring the goal of rehabilitation, the United States is moving back to recognizing it as crucial to community safety. Life without parole not only does not advance this goal, it negates it. The sentence sends an unequivocal message to youth offenders that they are banished from the community forever, no matter how they change or grow. In this regard, we note that the American Bar Association adopted resolution 105C in 2008, urging the adoption of laws to ensure that “Youthful offenders should generally be eligible for parole or other early release consideration at a reasonable point during their sentence; and, if denied, should be reconsidered for parole or early release periodically thereafter.”

Proponents of life without parole believe the sentence is necessary in order to ensure retribution—that society metes out the worst punishment for the worst offenses. However, while teens can commit the same acts as adults, by virtue of their immaturity they are not as blameworthy or culpable. They do not have adults’ developed abilities to think, to weigh consequences, to make sound decisions, to control their impulses, and to resist group pressures; their brains are anatomically different, still evolving into the brains of adults.

Neuroscientists conducting magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) research have uncovered striking physical differences between the brains of adolescents and those of adults, showing that the areas involved in impulse

control are less developed in youth. These findings suggest that states should revise their sentencing laws to ensure that youth are not sentenced as if they were adults.

Supporters of the life without parole sentence also claim that teens who pause to consider the consequences before committing crimes will be deterred if they face harsh sentences such as life in prison without parole. But young people are less likely than adults to pause before acting, and when they do, research has failed to show that the threat of adult punishment deters them from crime. Finally, incapacitation as a justification for life without parole sentences fails because some youth offenders can be rehabilitated and become productive members of society.

The terrible crimes committed by youth can cause injury and death and ruin lives. In its sentencing choices, the United States must reflect the harm these youth have caused. But it must also acknowledge that they are not all irredeemably violent people. Recognizing their capacity to grow and to transform themselves is deeply embedded in human rights principles. Instead of violating those principles with regularity, the United States should vigorously uphold them.

Submitted by the Coalition for the Fair Sentencing of Children

Children’s Advocacy Clinic, Children in Prison Project, Florida State University College of Law

Children’s Law Center, Massachusetts

Citizens for Juvenile Justice, Massachusetts

Columbia Legal Services, on behalf of clients, Seattle, Washington

DLA Piper, LLP

Bernardine Dohrn, Director, Children & Family Justice Center, Northwestern University School of Law

Family and Friends of Inmates, Omaha, Nebraska

Shaena Fazal, Director, Long‐Term Prisoner Policy Project, John Howard Association of Illinois

Brian J. Foley, Visiting Associate Professor of Law, Boston University School of Law

Human Rights Advocates, California

Human Rights Watch, New York

Individual parents, relatives, or friends of youth serving JLWOP sentences throughout the United States

Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana

Juvenile Law Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Michelle Leighton, Director Human Rights Programs, University of San Francisco School of Law

NAACP, Legal Defense Fund, New York

National Center for Youth Law, Oakland, California

National Juvenile Justice Network, Washington, D.C.

Penal Reform International, Washington, D.C.

Pendulum Foundation, Colorado

The Sentencing Project, Washington, D.C.

Jeffrey Shook, Assistant Professor of Social Work and Law, University of Pittsburgh

Randolph N. Stone, Clinical Professor of Law, University of Chicago Law School

Rev. Bonnie Young, Kings Crossing Foundation, Colorado

Youth Advocacy Project, Massachusetts Committee for Public Counsel Services

Youth Justice Coalition, Los Angeles (led by youth, including many serving LWOP and other life sentences

There is an even darker side to this company, that effects us.  Lehman Brothers was also the company that tried to pull off the biggest-ever private prison bailout by helping Corrections Corporation of America refinance a $1 billion credit agreement.  Lehman Brothers also helped Cornell Corrections, the number three private prison company set up stock offers and an Enron-esque “special purpose entity” that netted the prison company $217 million in additional capital.  Lehman Brothers is also one of the largest underwriters of private bonds.  Why is that interesting?  When Colorado voters denied the state funds to build another Supermax facility, the government turned to private gold bonds to  finance the new 900 + bed maximum security prison. 

There has been, and I hope continues to be, a grassroots movement that started on college campuses to stand against corporations that promoted prison expansion.  These organizations were quite effective against Sodexho-Marriott and Sodexho’s contracts with CCA.  They actually convinced Sodexho that it was in their best interest to sever their relationship with CCA or the campus activists would drive them off the campus.  Now that is a grass roots movement!  The name of the organization?  Not With Our Money!

These companies are just a small example of the corporations that are involved in prison expansion, prison labor or profiting in other ways from the enormous prison industry.  If you want to read more about this, I suggest (HIGHLY) that you read two books.  “The Perpetual Prisoner Machine” by Joel Dyer and “Prison Nation”. 

This young man made some dumb choices.  He chose to take the car keys (no doubt his parents would not have given permission so he took matters in his own hands), go out drinking and had an ACCIDENT.  A car ACCIDENT.  This was not an intentional act of violence.  Yet our DA’s chose to try this young man as an adult and punish him as severely as possible for his mistakes.  No accounting for who he was, what his history was in school or his reputation in his community.  Only over zealous DA’s and mandatory laws and sentences that condemn our children for making a mistake.  Yes it cost another persons life a horror that he would have lived with all of his days…..had he lived. 

The truth is those things happen everyday….and most of the time they do not involve a teenager that has been drinking.  Most of the time it involves adults who for any number of reasons, find themselves in car accidents and ……..sometimes people die.  Horrible, tragic and devastating to all involved.  Maybe that was you or maybe it will be in the future (heaven forbid).   If so, I hope you are shown more mercy than we showed this young man.

Once again we took a child and put him in an environment that was dangerous to his well being in a facility that was unprepared an unable to deal with a juvenile offender.  You see, the law requires that a juvenile held in an adult facility be kept from adult influences.  That means that they can have no contact with adult inmates.  In most circumstances, that requires that those facilities place these juveniles in holding cells or 24 hour lock down.  They are not equipped to meet the requirements of holding juveniles in county facilities.  When my son was held in county jail during the course of the investigation and hearings on his case, he was held in a holding cell with the lights on 24 hours a day, they were to have 1 hour out of their cell a day.  This was for exercise, phone calls and a shower.  There were times that they did not take him out for two and three days at a time.  Wellness checks from me would prompt them to bring him out for a phone call.  You are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty.  You should be held in an environment that will not cause you harm (mental or physical).  Jails and prisons should not create anti-social behaviors and violent tendencies……they are supposed to “Correct” behaviors. 

Who are we that we have become so heartless, condemning and self-righteous?  Who are we that we have become like those  in history who preyed on the unfortunate  and tortured them?  Read on……..

One wrong led to another

By Susan Greene
Denver Post Columnist

Article Last Updated: 11/01/2008 11:46:38 PM MDT

Richard Stewart cremated his son on Friday.

Jimmy was 17.

Days before he would have started his junior year at Wheat Ridge High School, he drank, drove and killed a man on Colfax Avenue.

He cooperated with police. He wept each time he went to court. And he wrote a six-page letter to the victim’s widow acknowledging that he messed up in the worst kind of way.

Jimmy was sorry. Very sorry. He didn’t dispute that he needed to serve his time.

Denver district attorneys chose to charge him as an adult — a move made possible under a 1993 law backed by Gov. Bill Ritter when he was Denver’s chief prosecutor. Such filings force teens into adult jails and left Jimmy unwatched in a cell long enough to hang himself with a bed sheet.

It took the city 15 hours to notify the family that their boy was dead.

And now, 11 weeks after the accident, not just one life, but two have been wasted.

“He took my husband’s life, and I’m just battling every day to keep on going,” says Iman Woods, the 28-year-old widow of accident victim Nathan Woods. “But he was in pain and needed help as a teenager, a kid. He was worthy of love, of a second chance eventually. And I keep thinking if I only could have hugged him, maybe it would have helped.”

Dead kids — even ones who commit vehicular homicide — are remembered in superlatives.

The kid whose dad wouldn’t allow him a driver’s license until he raised his grades made his family proud of his good humor and great looks.

“Weird, but he had the face of an angel,” Woods says.

The kid who had swiped his dad’s car keys, went on a drinking spree, crossed the center line and crashed into Nathan Woods’ car still dreamed of his own future beyond bars.

“I’m looking forward to spending all my time with you and to eat a lot of spaggeitte (sic) I’ll cook to stay healthy and eat right,” Jimmy wrote his dad from jail two weeks ago. “Me and you will have the best time of our lives and I’m going to help us get a two bedroom apartment and we’ll go do things that we haven’t got to do for a while like play catch . . .

“I promise, but stay strong.”

Even a kid who killed had people who adored him.

“Not for one second did we ever think of giving up on him,” Richard said after Thursday’s memorial service.

That notion was lost on DA Mitch Morrissey’s office when it chose to prosecute Jimmy as an adult, even though he had no criminal history.

Juvenile advocates persuaded lawmakers this year to pass a measure allowing teenage defendants to remain in juvenile centers rather than jails for adults. Ritter killed the bill with a veto.

So Jimmy was yanked out of a youth center and into the county jail, where visits with family consisted of brief talks on TV monitors. He told his sisters that sheriffs kept switching his antidepressants and shuffling him from cell to cell.

“Daddy,” he would say, “I’m scared to be alone.”

Denver sheriffs hadn’t put Jimmy on suicide watch. And, for whatever reason, they weren’t watching closely enough to protect a kid the system hadn’t yet convicted from his own despair.

“It makes no sense. My heart hurts over this,” says Maureen Cain of the Colorado Defense Bar.

There’s no telling what would have happened had sheriffs watched Jimmy more closely, prosecutors shown better judgment or Ritter signed the bill.

Maybe nothing could have saved him.

But a little mercy couldn’t have hurt.

Susan Greene writes Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Reach her at 303-954-1989 or greene@denverpost.com.

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• Switching his meds may have contributed to his suicide. I know from experience that a sudden major disruption in antidepressant use can cause suicidal thoughts. My deepest sympathies, another example of our grossly dysfunctional justice system.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 6:14 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• And when will legislators start using some common sense? Why put non-violent, first-offense kids in with adult murderers and rapists? Flies in the face of reason.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 6:22 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• My gosh, fire up the “waww-bulance.” Find someone a fiddle. Give me a band-aid for this bleeding heart. Wawww wawww wawww.

  17 years old and he already had a dead man in his past. Yet, we are supposed to grab the hanky and wipe away our tears for his self payment on this subject? I think not.

  Just be thankful he won’t be getting out to start all over again…and the next time it is your family member he might have killed.

  And to Socol, who thinks this is a misdemeanor or something:

  Umm…how non-violent does it have to be before someone dies? I mean, someone died because of this “precious angel.” What did you want to do to him? Take away his playstation? His Wii? It is people like you that scream for the early release of criminals and then cry about the deaths and mayhem the cause when released, calling for the head of the prosecutor, the judge, the jailer, and the governor. Hypocrite.
  john w
  Joined: Aug 10
  Points: 372 Permanent link to this commentjohn w (aka hillbillyavfan) | 6:35 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

• That’s your governor for you folks. Throw away the key for a kid, but don’t prosecute a cop who kills an innocent unarmed citizen.
  Roberta K
  Joined: Aug 4
  Points: 831 Permanent link to this commentRoberta K (aka Lazy R) | 6:35 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• Hey, Captain Over-Reaction (john w)- Of course he should do his time (he said so himself, did you read the article?) But this was not an act of violence and, as he sounded despondently remorseful, what makes you think there’d be a next time? How many times have you gotten behind the wheel after too much to drink, especially in your teens? He made a horrible decision, which he was about to pay for, but I don’t think he was on the path to recitivism.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 7:05 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

socol wrote:Hey, Captain Over-Reaction (john w)- Of course he should do his time (he said so himself, did you read the article?) But this was not an act of violence and, as he sounded despondently remorseful, what makes you think there’d be a next time? How many times have you gotten behind the wheel after too much to drink, especially in your teens? He made a horrible decision, which he was about to pay for, but I don’t think he was on the path to recitivism.

I’m sorry for both families. This was an unnecessary, heartbreaking tragedy.
donnybrook
Joined: Jun 21
Points: 56555 Permanent link to this commentdonnybrook (aka gardengirl) | 8:15 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

Lazy R wrote:That’s your governor for you folks. Throw away the key for a kid, but don’t prosecute a cop who kills an innocent unarmed citizen.

So he’s tough on crime, and he’s a bad governor? If he had let it pass, you’d tell him he was too soft on crime, no? Would he have been able to win with you?
donnybrook
Joined: Jun 21
Points: 56555 Permanent link to this commentdonnybrook (aka gardengirl) | 8:20 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

• Thanks for the clarification, donnybrook-
  The point that I want to make is that putting a kid in with an adult population of violent, sociopathic recitivists (I assume after sentencing he would have gone to prison rather that juvy) is probably going to turn that kid into a societal problem when he’s eventually released. The psychological, mental and physical abuse he’d receive in adult prison would probably turn him into a disfunctional part of society when released and he’d most likely end up back in prison. Aside from being unjust and unnecessary, it’s also a further burden on our overcrowded prison system and us, the taxpayers. I’m all for putting teenage gang-bangers, murderers, rapists, etc., in with the adults, they made a premeditated choice to kill, hurt, rape, etc. This kid’s act, while statutorily classified as violent, was not premeditated or intentional. Let him do his time in juvy, he stands a better chance of being a productive member of society upon release, which is better for all of us.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 8:43 AM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• Although I feel horrible for the family, there are some things that aren’t being fairly portrayed here. First of all, Sheriffs have no authority to “switch” anyone’s meds. If this kid’s meds were being changed, then it was the medical staff (not the Sheriffs) who switched them. These Doctors and nurses are the only ones who determine what meds (and what doses) inmates receive. Although they work at the jail, these medical personnel are NOT Sheriffs. They are employeed by Denver and do not answer to the Sheriffs.

  As far as them switching this kid’s cell repeatedly, there are many reasons for this. Mainly the fact that the Denver Jail is well over capacity at any and all times and they’re constantly shuffling inmates about to make room. Certain inmates must be kept in certain areas. You cant just throw inmates into the first open cell.

  I dont have any way of knowing what his behavior record was, but this could be another reason he was moved about the jail. Individual Sheriffs cannot just move inmates because they feel like it. All moves have to be approved.

  Finally, with well over 2000 inmates in a facility designed for 1500, how anyone expects the Sheriffs to have a permanent person assigned to watching just one inmate is beyond me. There aren’t enough Sheriffs to do this and the layout of the (ancient) facility makes it impossible to have a clear view of everyone at all times. If someone is determined to kill themselves, they will.

  If the Sheriffs weren’t doing their rounds, it will show. (They’ve got electronic measures in place to track this) If this is the case, heads will roll. The Sheriffs dont have the same teflon coating that DPD does. (Compare their disciplinary reports to DPD’s at the Independant Monitor’s website if you doubt me) Knowing that their movements can be tracked, these Sheriffs would be idiots to NOT do their walk throughs. If that is the case, someone will answer for that.

  Ultimately though, this kid made several bad personal choices. He chose to swipe the car keys and to go on a drinking spree. This resulted in an innocent person dying. He also chose to commit suicide. I do feel bad for the family… but these were all choices he made. When its all said and done, all of the tragedy associated with this story can be traced directly to him and his decisions.
  Chad K
  Joined: Nov 2
  Points: 0 Permanent link to this commentChad K (aka WatchingU) | 12:01 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

socol wrote:Hey, Captain Over-Reaction (john w)- Of course he should do his time (he said so himself, did you read the article?) But this was not an act of violence and, as he sounded despondently remorseful, what makes you think there’d be a next time? How many times have you gotten behind the wheel after too much to drink, especially in your teens? He made a horrible decision, which he was about to pay for, but I don’t think he was on the path to recitivism.

Socol, why don’t we just get together, we’ll urge the governor to just open up the jails and let everyone out. They deserve another chance. And it will alleviate the overcrowding problem in our jails. Yeah. lets do that. Let’s just open up the doors, make the guys pinkie swear that they will be good, and then let them go. That would be great.
john w
Joined: Aug 10
Points: 372 Permanent link to this commentjohn w (aka hillbillyavfan) | 12:21 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

• GG–you probably weren’t here yet, but when Ritter was Denver DA he exonerated cops no matter what they did and there were some pretty high-profile shootings that certainly sounded like an abuse of power. The cops cost the city quite a lot in settling lawsuits as well. These are the facts, madem, they have nothing to do whether I’m pleased or displeased.
  Roberta K
  Joined: Aug 4
  Points: 831 Permanent link to this commentRoberta K (aka Lazy R) | 12:53 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• hillbillyvan- Wow, I can’t believe you don’t think he deserved another shot at life. You really think he should have spend the rest of his life behind bars? There’s something drastically wrong with you. Do you honestly believe he was as likely to repeat in the same way that a sex offender is likely to repeat? Ever heard the saying “follow your bliss”? Congratulations, you’re already there. Enjoy your ignorance.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 2:15 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• The point is that the system is broken! People are going to make bad choices occasionally. There will be consequences. Those consequences are established by law and are generally just to fit the offense. I’m not asking the folks who are perfect to understand those of us who are not.

  As a former officer of DOC I have seen the short comings of the system first-hand. It is called corrections but should rightfully be called human warehousing. We are not giving these individuals the tools necessary to correct their decision making skills. We lock up murderers with someone who commited check fraud. We warehouse violent offenders with folks who were just plain dumb in their actions but not intentionally “violent”.

  The reality is that all of these people then do what is necessary in this prison culture (and it is a culture unto itself) to survive. They join gangs, assault other inmates, participate in riots, abuse drugs to mentally escape, etc. After seeing this happen time and time again, I firmly believe that it is this environment that contributes to recitivism. Check out our rate of recitivism in this state. It’s deplorable!

  We really need to look at how we are dealing with crime, criminals, the distinctions between offenses, and how we deal with offenders. There are far too many incidents like this that we do not hear about in the current system. In order to truly be a civilization we must try to maintain civility.

  My deepest condolences for the families that are grieving.
  Colorado N
  Joined: Sep 19
  Points: 1114 Permanent link to this commentColorado N (aka American Girl) | 2:50 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

• American Girl -Well said.
  ben s
  Joined: Oct 17
  Points: 250 Permanent link to this commentben s (aka socol) | 3:04 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse
• If he had killed my family member, I wouldn’t worry about him getting out to repeat the crime. The only way for him to pay back society for his deed was exactly what he did–a sheet noose. I am sure this was not his first time drinking, nor his first time driving, nor his first time to combine the two.

  My grandfather happened to be a victim of a drunk driver. He was going down the road, and a car driven by a drunk teen-ager (from my school) and 3 of his buddies were in my grandpa’s lane. Gramps nailed them head on. 4 drunk teens died that night, and my grandfather had trouble walking for the rest of his shortened life. The good news, though, is that those 4 teens never drank again.
  john w
  Joined: Aug 10
  Points: 372 Permanent link to this commentjohn w (aka hillbillyavfan) | 3:35 PM on Sunday Nov 2    (must be logged in to vote)   Report Abuse

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Read the article, watch the video that follows which was released by the Equal Justice Initiative and I will be back with you after the video.

Sunday, September 28, 2008 Teen charged with killing father Updated: 09/26/2008 06:55 AMBy: Jim Gibbons

ONEIDA COUNTY, N.Y. — Back in January, Joseph J. Giacona Jr. was murdered in his home in Vernon. Now, after an eight month long investigation, police have made an arrest and it is someone very close to home.

Thirteen-year-old Joseph Giacona III was arrested Thursday morning and charged in the murdering of his father.

In January, Joseph J. Giacona Jr. was found shot in the head in his Vernon home. Police say he was asleep on a couch at the time he was killed.  ‘State Police investigation at the scene revealed no indication of a struggle in the residence, no signs of forced entry and nothing missing from the home. The only weapons located in the home were found in a gun cabinet,’ said Major Donald DePass, Troop D Commander. The investigation was turned over to an Oneida County grand jury earlier this month after nearly eight months of examination. Because there were no eyewitnesses, the information for the case is based off a collection of facts, which is why it took such a long time to process.

‘It was imperative that the state police conduct and exhaustive and intensive investigation following up every possible lead and every possible theory with respect to this case,’ said Kurt Hameline, Oneida County Assistant District Attorney.

Giacona III had placed the 911 call the day of his father’s death. He has now been indicted on murder in the second degree and he will be tried as an adult in Oneida County Court.  ‘If convicted of murder in the second degree, a maximum sentence would be life imprisonment. The court would have to set a minimum of no less than five, no greater than nine,’ said Hameline.  Giacona III did plead not guilty in Oneida County Court Thursday morning. A pretrial conference has been set for Friday, October 3rd.
(Latest information:  Pre-trial has been moved to Movember1,2008).

The only saving grace in this young man’s story is that in the state of New York he cannot receive a sentence of Life Without the Possibility of Parole.  In my home state, he would. 

It is Cruel and Unusual Punishment to sentence a 13 or 14 year old to life (death) in prison.  More to the point, it is Cruel and Unusual Punishment for us to sentence ANY of our young people to Life in Prison.  While we can catch your attention and arouse your righteousness over this boy and the children in the video, we should be able to do the same concerning all the boys and girls serving life in prison. 

13, 14, 15, 16, 17………they are all kids.  They all have the same look of innocence.  They all deserve a chance.  I urge you to advocate against mandatory sentencing laws, laws that allow children to be prosecuted and sentenced as adults and laws that cause children to serve adult time in adult prisons.  I urge you to support HR 4300 (www.hr4300.com), which gives US a chance to undo the harm that has been done and give these kids a chance at LIFE. 

Thank you, Equal Justice Initiative (www.eji.org) , for battling on behalf of these children and for delivering such a stark message.

In Colorado, and specifically El Paso County, we are being confronted with a piece of legislation called 1 A labeled “for a Safer Community”.  While there are pieces of this county question that I personally would approve of, they are tied with other measures that I do not approve of.  The county question would address the ability of the county to protect portions of the population (specifically number 8):  Regional Child and Adult protection programs which shall be used to investigate prosecute, treat and prevent abuse and neglect of children and /or adults who are elderly and/or disabled in El Paso County.  However, the rest of the county question is directed to the building, expanding and strengthening of the office of the District Attorney, county corrections facilities, judicial offices and sheriff and police departments. 

This all sounds good in theory, because we want those facilities to be in good repair.  We would also like to see another work release facility in this county.  The problem comes when we tie those needs to the expansion of prison beds and the expansion of the prosecutors office.  If we are to enforce change in our current laws, causing law makers to re-examine the tough on crime policies that have caused the explosion in prison populations, we are going to have to send a clear message.  “NOT WITH OUR MONEY.”  We have to let them know, through our voting process, that we are tired of funding prison expansion programs and tough on crime policies.  We have to let them know that we are holding them to account to find real solutions to drug and alcohol offences, recidivism rates and juvenile crime policies that cause our young people to be incarcerated rather than reformed.  We have to let them know that we are no longer willing to fund a $734,000,000 Department of Corrections budget (Colorado proposed) without a clear plan on how to break the cycle of crime, educate and reform offenders and return them to a productive life that benefits our communities. 

In Colorado Springs, the county corrections community started a campaign for funding early in the year by enlisting local media to report on the potential danger that over crowding was causing in our county jail.  They interviewed guards, corrections officials and showed the current conditions while they labeled them a “time bomb”.  This put the issue of safety into the mind of voters.  

The real issue is the fact that we have very little in the way of community corrections, supervised sentences, house arrest or restorative justice practices in this community.  Our answer, as with most other municipalities, was put them in jail.  This has created a whole list of new problems.  Loss of job for the offender, economic hardship for the families, the effect of finding new jobs once released and the horrible conditions and treatment that has impacted the offender during his stay at the county facility.

I recently sat and talked with a 77 year old man that was given a jail term for violating a restraining order that was issued because he continually spoke out against the local school district.  While he was incarcerated he told me that he witnessed some of the worst conditions he had ever seen.  He related to me that one night at the change of shift (around midnight) the new sargent came on duty and announced over the loud speaker “  I am ____ and I am now in charge and I am not going to take any of your sh–!” 

We have continued to give them money without accountability, we have continued to give them the power to make laws without questioning their motives or the facts.  We have continued to fund things that we should not fund and neglect the things we should be attending to.  We are responsible.  In El Paso County we have a severe budget crisis as we do in the state of Colorado.  Could it be that we should have paid more attention?  Yes. 

This year……..think, ask, question and review…..BEFORE you vote.