Social justice journalist Beth Schwartzapfel has an important piece on juveniles sentence to life without parole (LWOP) and the legal fight to eliminate LWOP for young offenders:

A common perception is that these kids are “the worst of the worst,” and indeed, many juveniles sentenced to life have done terrible things. But HRW estimates that a quarter of them were, like Jennifer, convicted of “aiding and abetting” or of felony murders. Almost 60 percent had no prior criminal convictions. More than 70 juveniles were just 13 or 14 years old at the time of their crime — some so small when they arrived in prison that all the uniforms were too big for them. Anecdotally, many, like Jennifer, had been subjected to abuse and neglect, their childhoods marred by instability, poverty and violent or criminal behavior by the adults in their life. [AJAM]

The Supreme Court has already declared mandatory LWOP for juveniles to be unconstitutional and a handful of states have eliminated it as a punishment for young offenders. 

[Photo credit: shingst, Creative Commons.]