Juvenile Criminals Can Challenge Life Sentence without Parole Says Supreme Court

Supreme Court has decided on Monday about the rule which leaves juveniles' life sentence without parole. The United States Supreme Court said that the 2012 rule should be seen as a retroactive one.

This ruling happened because of the case of Henry Montgomery, a man from Louisiana, who killed a police officer when he was 17.  Yahoo News said Montgomery wants to be resentenced and is using the 8^th Amendment for his appeal. He has been locked up since 1963 and wants to at least be granted with parole. His lawyers argued that because of his age, he was scared and he did not know what to do so he shot the sheriff as he was panicking. Luckily for him the judges ruled in favor of him.

The nine judges ruled six to three as NPR stated. In 2012, there was a decision made also by the Supreme Court that stated the punishments for minors should be the same with adults. However, with this case, the Supreme Court said the past ruling is more applicable to special cases. They said the rule can be not applied to Montgomery's case as his crime was way before the rule was passed. They also said that there are cases in which the minor who committed the crime can still change so paroles should be given to them.

Justices Anthony Kennedy and Justice John Roberts wrote the decision. It has the approval of other liberal Justices namely Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan.

According to a report NBC News posted, an estimate of 1,000 prisoners will be affected by this new court decision. There are almost 3,000 criminals who were convicted when they were still a minor with life sentence without parole. Now, half of them can be granted with it as the other half were granted with parole already.

The Supreme Court decision gives hope to those adult who were imprisoned for life because of immaturity when they were still a minor. It will give them chance to change their life and do better things outside the prison. 

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United States Supreme Court, life sentence without parole, retroactive law, Louisiana, Henry Montgomery, minors, juvenile crimes, punishment for minors

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