Graham vs. Florida

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Graham vs. Florida

Case Summary

The Graham vs. Florida case was argued on November 9 2009 and it was decided by the Supreme Court on May 17 2010. The case featured Terrance Jamar Graham and two others who were the petitioners. Graham was accused of two cases, one of which was armed burglary. Under the law of Florida, it is the discretion of the prosecutor to decide whether someone below sixteen and seventeen years old to be charged for felony crimes as an adult or juveniles. Graham and other threes school age mates attempted to commit robbery in 2003, and at that time, Graham was sixteen years old. He was arrested and taken to a juvenile court because he was still below eighteen years. This is because according to the Florida law, anyone who commits any crime while below eighteen years is taken to juvenile court. The first trial was under a plea agreement in a Florida court and he was sentenced to three years of probation after pleading guilty to armed robbery with assault or battery and attempted armed robbery. Graham did not have a criminal record before this and his pled guilty was finally accepted. However, he was required to spend part of his probation in a pre-trial detention facility.

The court learned that Graham had dishonored his trial terms by committing other crimes and it provoked his probation. Six months after he was released from the facility, he was accused of armed robbery and he refused to stop when the police ordered him to, after committing a traffic offence. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in May 2006, after the court adjudicated him guilty of the previous charges. The court also sentenced him to fifteen years in jail for attempting burglary, which he was to serve concurrently with the previous sentence. The presiding judge decreed him to life sentence without a parole because of his violations. However, the Supreme Court does not allow the immature criminals to be judged for life imprisonment without being given first a parole for non-homicide criminals. Graham then challenged the court’s decision under the Eighth Amendment in the Appellate court of Florida. This amendment does not require excessive bond or heavy fines to be imposed on juvenile criminals nor heavy cruel punishment to be inflicted on (CornellStateUniversity, n. d.).

Graham pleaded under the clause of unusual punishment. He claimed that the sentence was harsh since it was not proportional to crime nature, and that it was in violation of international norms. Therefore, he wrote a note to the appellate court claiming that it was his first time to get into trouble and he is ready to change his life. His plea agreement was accepted by the trial court. However, after the court withheld guilt adjudication, they did not agree to any of his claims and it held that the decision was not an infringement of the Eighth Amendment. He appealed to the Florida Supreme Court, which declined jurisdiction. This compelled Graham to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court (CornellStateUniversity, n. d.). The U.S. Supreme Court held that sentencing a juvenile offender to life imprisonment for reason other than homicide was unconstitutional.

The sentence hearing was held by the trial court. Graham confronted his sentence basing on the Eighth Amendment, which states that there should be neither excess bail nor fines nor cruel and infliction of unusual punishments. The court has to determine whether the punishment is cruel and they have to view the historical conceptions because the extreme cruelty is not descriptive (CornellStateUniversity, n.d.). Therefore, after Graham’s the court listened to Graham’s testimony, he was found guilty and was a maximum sentence in the court. However, the sentence was not grossly corresponding to his felonies. The court concluded that Graham should be rehabilitated and was given unheard probationary life sentence for his felonies.

Interesting facts

One of the interesting facts about the case is that Graham had no prior criminal record before this case, yet he was accused of committing other crimes in a very short span of time. It is also interesting that the court decided to sentence him to life imprisonment without the option of parole for armed robbery yet he had not killed a person. Moreover, during the robbery, Graham did not assault the owner where the robbery took place, but his accomplice was responsible. In a previous case, Roper vs. Simmons, the court had abolished the death penalty and therefore the maximum sentence for murder was life without parole. Consequently, it is an interesting fact for the trial court to sentence Graham to life without parole. This meant that, in its perception, the crime he had committed was equal to murder.

Another fact is that during the trial, the prosecutor had recommended a total of forty-five years in prison and the defense counsel had sought a five-year sentence. The trial court handed Graham a life sentence, more than anyone had expected. Apart from Florida, ten other states in America sentence juveniles to life in parole without the option of parole. Of the 129 offenders who had such sentences during that time, Florida had the more than half of them. However, the Supreme Court allows juvenile criminals not to be sentenced for life without being given a parole. The reason for doing this is to abolish the capital punishment for juvenile criminals in the states (Shoemaker, 2009).

Consequently, issuing of life sentence imprisonment without giving a parole to cruel punishments to juvenile offenders is an interesting fact. Graham is twenty years man serving a life sentences exclusive of the parole in the FloridaState. He was arrested when he was sixteen years with other age mates for attempting robbery. He pled guilty to other several cases and under the plea agreement was sentenced for three years in jail with probation. Actually, there is a consensus among the states a bout life imprisonment without possibly giving a parole to inappropriate sentences cases to juveniles of non-homicide offenders (Davis, 2011). The reason behind this issue is that most of the states may be affected by the decision of the Supreme Court because different states have their own ways off treating juvenile offenders.

Outcome of the case

Petitioner Graham committed armed robbery and other crimes when he was 16 years old. Under the petition, the trial court in Florida sentenced him to trial and withheld arbitration of guilt. Consequently, the court found that violated his probation terms through committing more crimes. The trial court found him guilty of the first crimes and they withdrew his trial thus sentenced him for burglary without giving him a parole. The Florida abolished the parole system thus Graham was left without a possibility of release excluding managerial leniency. Graham had to challenge the trial court basing on the Eighth Amendment of cruel and unusual sentence clause. This clause does not permit juvenile criminals to be sentenced for life in jail without being given a parole.

The decision was delivered by justices Anthony M. Kennedy, John Paul Stevens, Stephen, G Breyer, Antonin Scalia, Samuel A. Alito Jr., Clarence Thomas, Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. When delivering the decision, Justice Kennedy noted that sentencing someone to life without the option of parole was denying him a chance to show that he is mature enough and has reformed his ways and he is therefore fit to rejoin the society. Thus, it was concluded that Graham should be rehabilitated. This is after he wrote a note to the appellate court pleading to be given a chance to change and continue with his studies. Nonetheless, Graham was sentenced in prison for five years because he committed many crimes whereby he was found guilty.

Personal thoughts, Feelings, Ideas on the case and its outcome

From my point of view, children should be given their freedom of rights because there are laws designed to protect the right of each individual. Under the Eighth Amendment, Graham has the right not be sentenced for life. From this case, Graham was treated like someone who committed murder and yet his crimes were not cruel or unusual. Thus, he could have not been sentenced for life because this is the same as inflicting death penalty. Furthermore, the law does not allow children less than eighteen years to be sentenced for life unless they have committed homicide crimes. This case shows how cases are unfairly handled in many courts and justice is not maintained in some courts.

In addition, according to the decision, delivered by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, John Paul Stevens and his colleagues, sentencing Graham for life without giving him a parole is denying him the chance to show that he is mature and he has reformed. Moreover, showing justice in the court is vital even if someone is found guilty. This is because he should be given allowed to exercise his rights. Davis (2011) points out that under the law, children are given freedom to exercise their rights even if someone has committed wrong things. However, he comments that this should not be taken as a privilege of involving in wrong things but exercising what is right for someone. Thus, Graham could not be sentenced for life but rather could be put in probation.

It should be acknowledged that juvenile life sentences without parole are widespread in many states than sentence practices. It is could be better if many states could move away from the notion of juvenile court systems and allow the juvenile criminals to be charged directly in adult courts. In addition, the courts need to include life sentence with a parole because sentencing someone for life without a parole especially to non-homicide criminals does not justify a verdict. Moreover, the laws are designed to protect every individual in the society even if one is a criminal or not.

References

CornellStateUniversity (n.d). Supreme Court of the united states Terrance Jamar Graham,

Petitioner Vs. Florida. Retrieved on July 20, 2011 from http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-7412.ZO.html

Davis, S. M. (2011). Children’s rights under the law. Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press.

Shoemaker, D. J. (2009). Juvenile delinquency. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.