The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday upheld a Wyandotte County hard 50 sentence of a juvenile.
Ronell Williams had appealed his sentence of mandatory life without parole, on the claim that it violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment for a juvenile.
The Kansas Court of Appeals had reversed and remanded the Williams sentence, but the Kansas Supreme Court on Friday reversed the Court of Appeals, affirming the Wyandotte County District Court decision.
According to court documents, Williams was convicted in 2000 of two counts of premeditated murder, one count of aggravated robbery and one count of aggravated burglary for acts he committed when he was 14 years old. For the murder convictions, he was sentenced to two concurrent life sentences without the possibility of parole for 50 years, a hard 50 sentence.
Years later, Williams filed an action stating that his sentence violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.
Williams was convicted of shooting and killing Wilbur and Wilma Williams, who were no relation to him, after allegedly trying to steal items from their house in 1999. It was an attempted auto theft.
The Supreme Court discussed whether the trial court adequately considered the young age of the offender before imposing life without parole. The Supreme Court cited a precedent in another juvenile case, decided after the Court of Appeals ruling in this case, which held the sentencing court did not have to explain how it considered youth and its characteristics before imposing life without parole on a juvenile offender.
According to the Supreme Court, the precedents in the case required a discretionary sentencing procedure, and the sentencing must comply with the precedent when the sentence is not mandatory and the trial judge has discretion to impose a lesser punishment in light of the youth of the defendant. Since the district court had discretion to impose a lesser sentence, the Jones vs. Mississippi precedent did not apply.
The opinion reversing the Court of Appeals was written by Justice Eric Rosen.