White Paper: Criteria and Procedures for Meaningful Parole Review for People Sentenced as Youth

In the late 1980s and 1990s, rising crime rates and the myth of the juvenile superpredator led many states to change the way that people were prosecuted and sentenced for crimes they committed under age 18, to devastating effect. The confluence of harsher penalties, mandatory minimum sentences, and easier, and sometimes automatic, transfer from juvenile to adult court, meant that thousands of children across the country received adult sentences for their crimes, often without any consideration of their youth. Over the same period, developmental research began to emerge that demonstrated that the adolescent brain is not yet fully developed and that the psychosocial maturity of youths differs fundamentally from that of adults. Studies also showed that youths are likely to outgrow criminal behavior, which for young people typically reflects the transient qualities of youth rather than irreparable criminality. In a series of decisions beginning in 2005, the United States Supreme Court, citing this emerging understanding of neurological and psychosocial development, acknowledged that children are different for purposes of sentencing, less culpable and more capable of change than adults who commit the same crimes. It therefore held that the Eighth Amendment prohibits treating children the same as adults in sentencing, banned the death penalty and mandatory life without parole sentences for youth, and limited the circumstances under which a life without parole sentence could be imposed. 

Thus, states began to reform how they sentenced children. As of 2023, twenty-eight states and the District of Columbia outlaw life without parole for crimes committed under age 18. Across the country, states have sought to comply with the Supreme Court’s Eighth Amendment jurisprudence through individualized resentencing proceedings, opportunities for sentence modification, expanded eligibility for parole, or some combination of these and other reforms. In the wake of such reforms, thousands of people across the country are serving life or long sentences with parole eligibility for crimes committed as youth.

This white paper examines the constitutional dimensions of parole review in this context, describes relevant legislative reform and litigation, and proposes model policies, with commentary addressing the substantive and procedural components of parole review for people sentenced for crimes committed under age 18. The model policies aim to ensure a realistic and meaningful opportunity for release that is based on assessment of youth and post-crime maturity and rehabilitation, with procedures to support decision-makers in comprehensive and accurate parole review.

Project resources include:

• White Paper: Criteria and Procedures for Meaningful Parole Review for People Sentenced as Youth (screen-readable regular size version and large print version)
• A Google Drive Folder available here, containing:
  • The model policies in (unfootnoted) word processing format, to facilitate copying, pasting, and modifying to a particular system or facility.
  • Referenced state parole policies for people sentenced as youth 
• Relevant litigation information and documents in a Clearinghouse special case case collection entitled "Juvenile Parole"

A version of the white paper is forthcoming: Tessa Bialek, A Realistic and Meaningful Opportunity for Release: Recommendations for Parole Review for People Serving Long Sentences for Crimes Committed as Youth, 24.1 Conn. Pub. Int. L. J. 1 (2024).