International Consensus

The United States stands alone in the practice of sentencing juveniles to life without parole

There are more than two thousand, five hundred three youth offenders serving life without the possibility of parole (LWOP) in the United States while in the rest of the world there are zero. Since 2005, when there were a few countries still using this sentence, country after country has changed their laws and stopped sentencing youth to LWOP. Now the U.S. is the only nation in the world to impose LWOP sentences on youth.

UNITED STATES: 2,503 youth sentenced to LWOP

REST OF THE WORLD: ZERO

Today, international institutions consider this to be an issue of grave concern because the sentence violates treaties and international standards of justice. The oldest human rights treaty to which the U.S. is a party, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), prohibits this sentence. The ICCPR’s oversight Committee instructed the United States to:

“Ensure that no such child offender is sentenced to life imprisonment without parole,” [and] “adopt all appropriate measures to review the situation of persons already serving such sentences.”

It is not just one treaty that the US is violating with its practice of imposing LWOP on youth. The U.S. is in violation of its obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and may also be violating its treaty obligations under the Convention against Torture. That oversight Committee told the U.S. that the sentence could constitute: “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” for youth. In addition, the U.N. General Assembly has called upon governments to: “abolish by law, as soon as possible,…life imprisonment without possibility of release for those below the age of 18 years at the time of the commission of the offence.” The Convention on the Rights of the Child also prohibits any such sentence and its oversight Committee is urging governments to ban all life sentences for juveniles.

Historically, the United States was a Juvenile Justice Role Model for the World

The United States was the first government to recognize the special needs of youth in the justice system. In 1899 Cook County in Chicago, Illinois created the juvenile court based on the understanding that children, still developing, posses the capacity to rehabilitate . The best results for youth and society as a whole come when young people are not placed in the adult penal system. The United States paved the way with the conception of a separate juvenile court and the rest of the world quickly followed suit. It is time for the U.S. to return to a position of leadership in effective and humane treatment of youth who commit crimes.