In Miller v. Alabama, the United States Supreme Court declared that mandatory juvenile life without parole sentencing schemes violated the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment (Rhodes, 2012).
This all stems from a night back in 2003, when Evan Miller, Colby Smith and their neighbor Cole Cannon got into a fight at some point during the day. Evan Miller was 14 years of age at the time and Colby Smith was 16 years of age at the time. Later on that evening, Evan Miller and Colby Smith robbed Cole Cannon of $350 and stole his baseball card collection. After they robbed him, they then beat him with a baseball bat and then proceeded to set fire to Cole Cannon’s trailer. The fire department later found his body inside the burnt trailer. Both were eventually arrested for the crime.
Colby Smith pled guilty to felony murder received life in prison with parole. However, Evan Miller went to trial and was convicted by
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Supreme Court established in Miller that adolescent offenders’ immaturity requires special consideration in sentencing. The Court’s decisions were influenced in part by the convergence of recent normative research on brain development and on behavioral functioning of adolescents (Grisso and Kavanaugh, 2016).
There were two cases that were considered at the same time when the Supreme Court was making their decision. Those were Miller v State and Jackson v State. Both cases involved fourteen year old juveniles murdering another individual. The Court relied on distinct “strands of precedent” to justify its Miller conclusion. According to the Court, the two classifications for proportionality challenges are the length of term-of-years, accounting for the attendant circumstances; and categorical restrictions when imposing the death penalty (Darden, 2014).
There were five factors introduced with Miller’s case by the Supreme Court. The five characteristics or consequences of juveniles’ immaturity relevant for mitigation of