Prison advocates, attorneys and state officials are gearing up to help the estimated 200 prisoners now eligible for parole since a landmark decision last week by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court raised the minimum age to 21 before people could be sentenced to life without parole.
The Committee for Public Counsel Services, the state’s public defender agency, says it is working with the Parole Board to identify prisoners who are newly eligible to be considered for release as the agency prepares at least 40 attorneys to represent them.
Less crowded prisons? Sounds good. Combating the whole “tried as an adult” which was always kind of bullshit? Sounds good.
100%, I just want to spread the word on this one because even though the state is putting in some effort to find prisoners who qualify they’re still going to have to know they qualify and file some paperwork to actually make these early releases happen
Those jailhouse lawyers are going to spread the word on this like wildfire, and inmates will be filing handwritten habeas corpus petitions by the ream if have to. Don’t have to worry about that. Of course thinking about it, I imagine this is not going to affect very many inmates. Hopefully their computer system can tell who they are.
It doesn’t lead to less crowded jails, it just means that there will be more parole hearings. It doesn’t even guarantee that people that would have received a no parole sentence will actually get released at some point.
That’s not what happened, did you not read the article? They raised the age cutoff from 18 to 21, meaning the only people covered by the decision were actual adults at the time, not juveniles tried as adults.
Yes, but I think my general sentiment stands. Sentencing an 18 year old to life? Sentencing a 17 year old as an adult? Both are crazy
Trashachusetts being soft on law and order, no shock to anyone. I hate that I was born in that shit hole
So a 20 year old mass murderer will get a shot at parole? Isn’t one if the arguments against the death penalty that we can always sentence them to life without parole, and now that is going away?
Do you think parole boards of the future are going to be incompetent?
I do not believe they can predict the future.
In any case, I believe some crimes are so heinous, life without parole should be the sentence. I don’t care how old you are. If you have mens rea, that should be the sentence.
And if society agrees with you at that time, the parole board will make that decision. Taking away their power to decide seems like us trying to predict the future.
There is no need to predict the future. It’s the punishment they should get for a heinous premeditated murder.
