by Adolfo Flores
Antonio Núñez, a 14-year-old youth from California, paid a high price for his actions during a night out with older friends. He participated in kidnapping, 7and was behind the wheel of a subsequent high-speed chase by police. Núñez received the state’s most severe sentence after the death penalty, life without parole (LWOP).
Children of color, in particular, are disproportionately sentenced to LWOP in the United States, according to a study by the University of San Francisco School of Law.
California has the highest racial disparity in the nation, with Latino youth being five times more likely to receive life without parole than white children.
Núnez is one of 94 Latino youth out of a total of 227 sentenced to LWOP in that state, according to the study, Sentencing Our Children to Die in Prison.
The report attempts to raise awareness on the issue.
Plans are for it to be used as a lobbying tool to pass S.B. 999, a California bill that seeks to abolish the practice.
“There is severe racial profiling that goes well throughout the system,” said study co-author Michelle Leighton, director for human rights programs at the Center for Law and Global Justice. “This disparity continues across the country.”
In North Dakota, for example, Latino children are 16 times more likely to receive LWOP than white children. In Pennsylvania Latino children are three times more likely.
“Youth of color have a disadvantage at every stage of the criminal justice system,” Leighton said.
Children of color, for example, are held in custody, prosecuted as adults in criminal courts, given adult sentences and are more likely to do their time in adult prisons than whites.
The study claims the U.S. government is aware of the problem but has done little to address these disparities. It adds the government does not even collect data on racial disparity among juveniles receiving LWOP.
Experts argue these sentences have an adverse effect on their development.
“They’re subjected to violence and sexual violence at the hands of other prisoners and in some cases correctional officers,” said Alison Parker, senior researcher in the U.S. program of Human Rights Watch.
Parker, who has conducted past research on the issue, said the number of youths receiving LWOP in California alone has increased by 47 since 2005.
During her research she has spoken with authorities on these disparities. Their answer is that children of color commit more crimes than white youth.
“We can’t say conclusively that the fact that more kids of color are sentenced to life without parole is due to racism,” Parker said.
Through out the world there are 2,388 youth sentenced to die in prisons. Of those, all were sentenced in the United States except for seven in Israel. They are the only two countries that have youth serving LWOP.
The report claims the United States directly violates the International Civil and Political Rights Covenant, which states that juveniles can be tried in adult courts in “exceptional circumstances.”
Connie de la Vega, coauthor of the study, argued the thousands of juveniles sentenced to LWOP well exceeds its mark of “exceptional circumstances.
The authors argue the United States maintains that it only sentences juveniles to LWOP at the state level, not the federal level, and that states don’t have to follow international law.
Parker called the argument “ridiculous because states are obliged to follow international law. There are youths serving LWOP in federal prisons, I found one.”
She said that during her research she met one youth at the U.S. Penitentiary in Ellenwood, Pa.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics stated they had no data because there were no youths serving LWOP in federal prisons.
Hispanic Link.
