Brandon McInerney: 19 days too old for justice
Michael Mehas says it’s too bad for Brandon McInerney that he wasn’t born 19 days later. “If he were 19 days younger, he would be legally unfit to be tried as an adult.”
You will recall that Brandon is the Oxnard, CA, youth charged with first-degree murder and a hate crime in connection with the Feb. 12 killing of his classmate Larry King, 15, who sometimes wore makeup and told friends he was gay.
Brandon is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday. He will be tried as an adult under the provisions of California’s Proposition 21, which allows prosecutors to bring murder charges against juveniles as young as 14.
Mehas objects to the way the prosecutor charged the case. A writer and attorney, Mehas is also a counselor and guide to troubled teens and their parents:
Because Brandon is being tried as an adult, and if convicted — which appears assured — he will spend the rest of his life in a California men’s adult prison. [...]
The sad part about all of this is that there are Brandon McInerneys all over our country. According to Human Rights Watch, at least 227 people, who were under 18 at the time they committed their crimes, have been sentenced in California to life without the possibility of parole. In the United States, at least 2,380 people are serving life without parole for crimes they committed when they were under 18.
In the rest of the world combined, only seven people are known to be serving a life sentence for crimes committed when they were juveniles. International law prohibits the use of life without parole for those who are under 18. The United States is in violation of those laws.
The reasons children should not be given life sentences are quite simple. As the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in its landmark 2005 opinion in Roper vs. Simmons, it is unconstitutional to impose the death penalty on criminals for offenses committed when they were younger than 18. The court ruled that doing so violates the Constitution’s Eighth Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment.
“Their own vulnerability and comparative lack of control over their immediate environments,” the court majority reasoned in Roper, “mean juveniles have a greater claim than adults to be forgiven for failing to escape negative influences in their whole environment.”
This same rationale that led the court to outlaw the execution of juveniles applies equally to the second-harshest penalty available to our justice system, life without possibility of parole. The vulnerability and immaturity — and thus, the diminished culpability that the high court recognized in banning the death penalty for juveniles — are factors equally present for juveniles facing life sentences.
RELATED: I’m not personally familiar with the Integral Movement, but Integral Newswatch has a couple of posts on the case that (despite an over reliance on the Newsweek Cover Story) express considered views I haven’t seen elsewhere; Understanding the Tragedy of Larry King: Beyond Political Extremism to Real Solutions and Larry King, Ellen DeGeneres, and Social Paralysis.
RichardR’s diary entry at Daily Kos, A Life Worth Saving, includes some of what I read the anonymous Integral author as objecting to.
2 Responses to “Brandon McInerney: 19 days too old for justice”
If you mean Thirteen (13) years PLUS 19 days… Why not just say it.
The kid had been FOURTEEN for less than TWO weeks.
The flaws in the cited author's arguments are legion.
“In the rest of the world combined, only seven people are known to be serving a life sentence for crimes committed when they were juveniles.”
Oh come on. The author is being selective, and using the weasel term “are known”. I imagine in China, or Africa, the Middle East or Latin America . . . children are regularly executed for crimes (instead of costly imprisonment). I am sure if the author spent a few minutes on Google, state atrocities would leap out. Instead, rhetorical points are being scored against the United States.
“International law prohibits the use of life without parole for those who are under 18. The United States is in violation of those laws.”
Those laws do not apply to the United States. Indeed, in the recent Mexican case, the Supreme Court explicitly rejected the asserted authority of the World Court to dictate or override Texas law.
I am sure the author considers the rulings of the World Court to take precedence over American law and the Supreme Court. Indeed, the above quote makes clear his view that international laws take precedence, and the US is violating those laws.
The Supreme Court happens to explicitly disagree with the author on this. Whatever. The author KNOWS the US is violating international law, whatever the Supreme Court may say otherwise.
“The reasons children should not be given life sentences are quite simple. As the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in its landmark 2005 opinion in Roper vs. Simmons, it is unconstitutional to impose the death penalty on criminals for offenses committed when they were younger than 18. . . . This same rationale that led the court to outlaw the execution of juveniles applies equally to the second-harshest penalty”
Why should the same rationale apply equally . . . as the death penalty is generally regarded as being far more extreme a punishment than life imprisonment. Children have a greater claim, the Court majority wrote – but not an ABSOLUTE claim. There is a matter of proportion here. The death penalty is outlawed for minors, as if applies to adults . . . but not life imprisonment without parole.
Indeed, where does one draw the line?
Arguably, there should be gradations.
Does one believe that teenagers who murder people should receive psychological counselling, and immediately be released to the care of their families?
Countries such as the UK are dealing with unprecedented levels of youth crime, and teenagers who know they are effectively immune from justice.