Case: People v. Stovall

This action arose from a successive motion for relief for judgment filed by the defendant in this criminal case on June 29, 2017 in Michigan state trial court (Third Circuit Court, case no. 92-0334-01). The defendant pleaded guilty in 1992 to second degree murder; the plea deal included a sentence agreement for life in prison with the possibility of parole, or parolable life.  In the motion at issue here, the defendant argued that his plea was illusory and that his sentence violated the Eighth Amendment because it denied him a meaningful opportunity for release as required under Graham and Miller.  On August 23, 2017, Judge Kelly Ramsey denied defendant's motion, holding that Miller and its progeny did not apply retroactively, that the plea was not illusory, and that the defendant had a meaningful opportunity for parole.  The court of appeals denied defendant's initial application for leave to appeal on August 23, 2018. The Michigan Supreme Court remanded the case back to the appellate court for consideration "as on leave granted" on June 19, 2019. 504 Mich. 892. On November 5, 2020, the appellate court affirmed the trial court's denial of relief. 334 Mich.App. 553.  The Michigan Supreme Court granted review on April 30, 2021, directing the parties to brief the constitutionality of defendant's sentence under the federal and state constitutions.  507 Mich. 938.  

On July 28, 2022, the Michigan Supreme Court vacated the defendant's sentence, finding that it violated the state constitutional prohibition against cruel or unusual punishment.  The court reasoned that although defendant's federal Eighth Amendment challenge to his parolable life sentence failed under Miller and subsequent U.S. Supreme Court cases, the Michigan Constitution offered broader protections, forbidding unusually excessive imprisonment. The Court cited as evidence of disproportionality the likelihood that, pursuant to the state's Miller-fix statute, a person convicted of first-degree murder committed as a child was likely to be released earlier than a person sentenced to parolable life for second-degree murder committed as a child.  The Court further cited the failure of parolable life sentences to offer the requisite meaningful opportunity for release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation.  To that point, the Court noted that parolable lifers were given lower priority for educational and rehabilitative programming, as well as the susceptibility of the parole process to "the fluctuations of executive branch policies," including policies that might instruct the parole board to forgo consideration of all lifers for parole. Holding that parolable life sentences for juvenile offenders convicted of second-degree murder violated the Michigan Constitution, the Court vacated the defendant's sentence and remanded to the trial court for further proceedings.