NCJ Number
166065
Date Published
1995
Length
50 pages
Annotation
A discussion of death sentences for juveniles since juvenile capital punishment was reinstated in the 1970's accompanies profiles of the cases of eight juveniles who received the death penalty.
Abstract
Amnesty International reports that more than 90 juveniles who committed murders when they were ages 15-17 have been sentenced to death since the reinstatement of the death penalty. The United States has more juvenile death row inmates than any other country known to Amnesty International. The majority appear to have come from particularly deprived or unstable family backgrounds. Child abuse, drug abuse, mental illness, and mental retardation were common. Most were represented at trial by court-appointed attorneys or public defenders who sometimes spent little time preparing the case for trial. Many attorneys did not present important mitigating evidence at the trial or sentencing hearing. The case profiles focus on Christopher Burger, Janice Buttrum, Joseph John Cannon, Paula Cooper, James Terry Roach, Heath Wilkins, Dalton Prejean, and David Tokman.