Roper v. Simmons In September 1993, Christopher Simmons was only a junior in high school when he committed a capital crime at age seventeen. This crime was premeditated for two years. Two of his friends, Charlie Benjamin who, was fifteen and John Tessmer who was sixteen, were a part of it in the plan, but when it came time to take action, John Tessmer refused to go with them. At 2 o’clock in the morning, the two boys broke into Shirley Crook’s house and kidnapped her. They tied her up and drove the van to a railroad trestle that stretched across the Meramec River. There, Simmons pushed her off the bridge into the river below. Nine months later, the trial began. On September 8th, Christopher Simmons, John Tessmer, and Charlie Benjamin met at Brian Moomey’s house at 2 o’clock in the morning. Moomey was a twenty-nine year old convicted felon who allowed teenagers to “hang out” at his house. Right before they were going to leave, John Tessmer backed out and refused to go with them. He returned home. After Tessmer left, the two went to Shirley Crook’s house. She was home alone that night. Mr.Crook was on an overnight trip. They got into the house by reaching through an open window and unlocked the back door. Simmons turned on the hallway light, which awoke …show more content…
He later reenacted the crime for the police. Minor laws state that minors cannot receive certain punishments since they are under the age of an adult. The U.S. Supreme Court said that it was cruel to punish the mentally disabled and it violated the Eighth and the Fourteenth Amendment. The Mississippi Supreme Court reconsidered Simmons’ case. They looked at the Stanford v. Kentucky case from 1989. The Court found that minors can only be sentenced to death if the charges warrant execution. They found that capital punishment between the ages of sixteen and seventeenth did not violate any rights of the 8th