One of the two teens in Iowa, USA that bashed their high school Spanish teacher to death with a baseball bat over a bad grade was sentenced Thursday, July 6 to life in prison.
Willard Miller, 17, could be eligible for parole after 35 years behind bars for the vicious murder of 66-year-old Nohema Graber in 2021. Read my comment for more details below
COMMENTS
Him and other kid didn’t get a “life” sentence. They are eligible for parole. In Iowa, life usually means life.
In 2012 the United States Supreme Court issued an opinion in Miller V. Alabama which prohibits the mandatory sentence of Life Without Parole for juvenile offenders anywhere in this country. Juvenile offenders must be given the opportunity to demonstrate maturity and rehabilitation. If they do so, they must be given another chance.
I am such. In 1995, I was 16. I was sentenced to 2 Life Without Parole plus other term of year sentences for double homicide and other crimes. I should have never gotten out. But through this change in law, and Florida’s interpretation of it, I was released after serving a little more than 27 years.
The science behind it is that juveniles aren’t inherently evil. That it’s a transitory phase of maturity. And so, we can EARN a second chance if we can prove we have matured and been rehabilitated. We still must spend a huge chunk of our lives in prison first. And I am aware that’s not much satisfaction for the victims and their families.
But that’s why, in this case, Life didn’t actually mean Life.
