More than 250 felons sent to prison for life with no chance of parole for crimes committed when they were 18 years old must have their sentences reviewed under a decision released Wednesday by the Michigan Supreme Court.
The unanimous 6-0 decision expands an earlier ruling that lifers convicted of first degree- or felony murder when they were younger than 18 are entitled to resentencing hearings. (Justice Kimberly Thomas recused herself from the case because she was involved in it before joining the Supreme Court in January.) The same will now apply to 18-year-olds.
“And at that resentencing, they’ll have the opportunity to demonstrate to the circuit court that they are rehabilitated and capable of rejoining society,” said attorney Maya Menlo with the State Appellate Defender Office says life without parole remains an option.
“Life without the possibility of parole is still on the table,” she told Michigan Public Radio. “The prosecuting attorneys in each county will review the cases and will decide whether they want to pursue a sentence of life without parole, but we expect that that sentence will be extremely rare.”
Special Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Timothy Baughman said now prosecutors have to make some decisions on these cases.
“Prosecutors are going to have to look at them and determine, are we just going to accede to a resentencing to a term of years or is this one of the cases that we want to have a hearing on and argue that the defendant should still get life without parole? So there’s a lot of decisions that are going to have to be made by prosecutors,” he said.
The defendant is John Antonio Poole, who was 18 years old in 2002 when his uncle paid him $300 to shoot a man because his girlfriend owed him money. Poole is now 42 and being held at the Richard A. Handlon Correctional Facility in Ionia.
In a related case, the state Supreme Court will rule soon on whether to expand the ruling to include lifers sentenced for crimes committed as 19- and 20-year-olds.
