US court reviews life terms for teens

Joe Sullivan was sent away for life for raping an elderly woman and judged incorrigible, although he was only 13 at the time of the attack.

Terrance Graham, implicated in armed robberies when he was 16 and 17, was given a life sentence by a judge who told the teenager he threw his life away.

They didn't kill anyone, but they were effectively sentenced to die in prison.

Just over 100 prison inmates in the United States are serving those terms, according to figures compiled by opponents of the sentences.

Now the Supreme Court is being asked to say that locking up juveniles and throwing away the key is cruel and unusual - and thus, unconstitutional. Arguments are being presented this week.

Sullivan, now 33, and Graham, now 22, are in Florida prisons, which hold more than 70 per cent of juvenile defendants locked up for life for non-homicide crimes.

The Supreme Court's latest look at how to punish young criminals flows from its decision four years ago to rule out the death penalty for anyone younger than 18.

"From a moral standpoint, it would be misguided to equate the failings of a minor with those of an adult, for a greater possibility exists that a minor's character deficiencies will be reformed," Justice Anthony Kennedy said.

The state of Florida, backed by 19 other states, says it should retain flexibility in sentencing so that "particularly heinous acts that stop short of causing death" can be punished vigorously.

Life without parole "is appropriately rare and reserved only for the worst of the worst offenders", crime victims' groups said in court papers.

Most victims of juvenile violence are also young, the groups said, citing Justice Department statistics.

"Softening sentences for juvenile offenders puts actual children in harm's way."

But opponents of such sentences said that most states have rejected life terms for juveniles when no one was killed.

The 109 juveniles serving terms of life without parole are in Florida and seven other states - California, Delaware, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska and South Carolina - says a Florida State University study.

More than 2000 other juveniles are serving life without parole for killing someone.

Only nine people are serving life sentences for crimes committed when they were 13. The number rises to 73 when 14-year-olds are added.

No other country allows life sentences for young offenders, opponents say.

Lawyers for Graham and Sullivan argue that it is a bad idea to render a final judgement about people so young.

"They are unfinished products, works in progress," said Bryan Stevenson, who will argue Sullivan's case at the high court.

Actor Charles Dutton, former US Senator Alan Simpson and others who committed crimes as teenagers have opposed life without parole sentences.

Wyoming Republican Alan Simpson served 18 years in the Senate, but as a teenager pleaded guilty to setting fire to an abandoned building on federal property, and later spent a night in jail for hitting a police officer.

Simpson said he sees no good argument for refusing even to review the sentences after the passage of time.

He said if a prisoner shows he is not fit to be released, "throw him back in".

"That's better than saying, 'Sorry, we can't look at that file because you were sent here for life'." AP