Since 2009, 1,000 people who were condemned as children to life without the possibility of parole in prison have been released. They are now home and free. These are all humans who were told as children that they were worth nothing more than dying in prison, and yet, today, many of them are shining examples of leadership in communities across the country. As a youth sentencing reform advocate who spent over a decade in prison for my involvement in a violent crime as a child, I know firsthand that redemption is possible — and despite heated rhetoric around the legal system today, there are hundreds more people like me who could make their communities better by coming home.
In my work as co-executive director of the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth and co-founder of the Incarcerated Children’s Advocacy Network (ICAN), I work directly with some of the people released after juvenile life without parole (JLWOP) sentences and have seen their leadership firsthand. They are living proof that investing in rehabilitation works. ICAN members are serving their neighbors and families through a variety of means, including running food ministries, working to address violence in their communities, mentoring youth, helping people returning home from prison, and other vocations in everything from commercial truck driving to leadership roles at major corporations. One study found that the rate of recidivism among this group is as little as 1%.
I call attention to these people because I see us backsliding into the failed policies and rhetoric of the past. Instead, we should learn from the policy mistakes that put them and so many others behind bars. Today, I see legislative hearings where children are referred to as “sociopaths,” when not so long ago I was one of the kids who carried this kind of label. In the 1990s, they called us “superpredators,” and told us that we would never change. But the bleak future predicted back then of teenagers becoming lifelong violent monsters simply didn’t come to pass. Instead, people sent to prison as children proved that they are more than their worst actions — and research demonstrates that criminal behavior sharply declines with age. Throwing children away in the name of being tough on crime didn’t work then, and it won’t work now.
I was once a child who committed a significant act of harm, and it’s one I am fighting to repair to this day. At 13 years old, I was sent to prison after playing a role in the gang-related murder of a 14 year old child, Pedro Martinez — a horrible mistake for which his family forgave me but I will continue to atone for the rest of my life. At the time of my conviction, a judge told me “you’re incorrigible, you’re never going to change.” Though there was a long road ahead to begin to repair the harm I caused, I knew in my heart that this wasn’t true, and after more than 13 years inside, I was given a second chance at freedom.
Prior to my release, I vowed to live out my life as an “eternal apology” to Pedro and his family, and from the beginning, I wanted to help children who were impacted by violence and involved in the criminal legal system – people like me who I knew could be so much more than the labels they carried. I completed my education, earning a Master’s degree and working in various fields including violence prevention, youth counseling, clinical research, and sentencing reform. Today, that work has brought me to lead the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY), an organization dedicated to ending life without parole sentences for children and ensuring that people convicted as children have a fair chance to thrive upon release.
Our fight to end juvenile life without parole has been challenging, but over the last decade a diverse group of officials — judges, lawmakers, advocates, and people directly impacted by the system — have started to reverse extreme sentencing practices that set the United States apart from the rest of the world. Through a series of decisions starting in 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court uplifted adolescent brain development research as a consideration for youth when being sentenced, providing legal relief for many of these 1,000 individuals and paving a pathway for legislative bans of JLWOP. Today, 28 states have banned life without parole sentences for children. As a result of these rulings and reforms, people have come home through a variety of circumstances, including judicial review of sentences, parole, and compassionate release, among others. In each instance, they proved to a sentencing authority that they had taken accountability and rehabilitated themselves in preparation to repair the harm they caused as teenagers.
The fact is, there remain hundreds of people behind bars who deserve a fair opportunity to prove that they have been rehabilitated and are worthy of being able to live out their eternal apologies. Hundreds of people in this country are still serving life without the possibility of parole for crimes they committed as children, and thousands more are serving so many years behind bars that they won’t have an opportunity to prove they have changed before it’s too late. We are all better off with these people as our neighbors in the free world.
For those of us who work in criminal legal reform, our day-to-day can feel saturated with exhausting tales of injustice, adversaries with a taste for severe punishment, and the deeply felt consequences of systemic inequity. The work is hard, and the wins hard-won, but that makes writing this piece with an offering of good news even sweeter. One thousand people who were once sentenced to life without parole as children and told they would die in prison are now free — a milestone we did not think would be possible even a few years ago.
I ask lawmakers, advocates, and judges considering a return to harsh punishment for youth offenses to see us, and see the reality of redemption that our experiences prove. Together, we can end the dehumanizing practice of labeling children as monsters and sentencing them to die in prison. No child is born bad, and no child is beyond hope of redemption.
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