Sentenced to Life for Rape at 13, Man Now Seeks Chance for Parole
In the entire world, only eight people reportedly are serving life terms for rape that were imposed for crimes committed when the defendant was 13 years old. All are in the United States.
One is Joe Sullivan, now 33, whose lawyers are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear their appeal arguing that the sentence constitutes cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth Amendment, reports the New York Times.
Among the eight, he is one of only two whose crime did not also involve a murder; like Sullivan, the other man also was sentenced in Florida and also is black.
There is no DNA evidence that can be tested in the case, because the state destroyed it in 1993. And, although Bryan Stevenson of the Equal Justice Initiative says he believes not Sullivan but one of the older youths who committee a burglary with him was the actual assailant who raped a 72-year-old woman in Pensacola in 1989, it is not claimed innocence but a potential chance for release that is at issue in the appeal.
“I don’t think it’s possible to say that a 13-year-old will never change and that life without parole is an appropriate punishment,” Stevenson tells the newspaper.
The state has not yet filed a response to the certiorari petition, according to the Times.
