Zooming out to Zoom in: A National Look at Life without Parole Sentencing Legislation for Youth in the United States

Background and Purpose: Since Miller v. Alabama in 2012, we have seen widespread reform to states’ sentencing statutes for people under 18 convicted of homicide offenses. With Miller, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that mandatory use of life without parole sentences for children (JLWOP) convicted of homicide violates the Eighth Amendment’s protection against cruel and unusual punishment. It required states to take factors related to youthful immaturity into account when making sentencing decisions. As the U.S. is the only country to impose life without parole sentences on children, this period of legislative reform brings states’ sentencing policies into better alignment with international standards for the treatment of children. It also signals a step toward unraveling tough-on-crime era policies that resulted in the unprecedented punishment of youth. The Court’s Montgomery v. Louisiana decision in 2016 clarified that Miller was retroactive. However, states were not provided guidance for resentencing procedures nor crafting new sentencing and release parameters that adequately considered youthfulness, contributing to variation in resentencing outcomes. Despite the prevalence of JLWOP sentencing reform since Miller, there has yet to be any comprehensive, national review of state legislation restricting JLWOP’s use. This paper tracks legislation enacted to comply with Miller and Montgomery to systematically categorize the types of reform, analyze legislation change over time, and examine variation in dimensions of JLWOP reform.

Methods: We used policy surveillance and tracking methodology to identify 46 pieces of legislation across 34 states and the District of Columbia between June 2012 and February 2025. We converted various dimensions of state statutes (e.g., discretionary use of JLWOP, resentencing mechanisms, parole eligibility) into a quantifiable dataset for analysis.

Results: Findings show most statutes (N=21) eliminate JLWOP for minors, both prospectively and for retroactive resentencing, while seven ban its use for prospective cases but keep it as an option for retroactive cases. The remaining statutes (N=18) maintain JLWOP as a discretionary sentencing option. Generally, states adopted one of three resentencing mechanisms to address retroactive JLWOP sentences: blanket legislative relief (N=13), individualized resentencing (N=11), and judicial review (N=5). All but three statutes allow a maximum sentence of either LWOP or life with parole for some homicide offenses perpetrated by children. The remaining three are the only statutes that guarantee eventual release for all youth. Most statutes (N=35) specify how much time needs to be served before eligibility for potential release, ranging from 15 to 40 years, with 12 statutes differentiating earliest release eligibility based on offense characteristics.

Conclusions and Implications: Lack of federal guidance in Miller and Montgomery resulted in a high degree of variability in JLWOP sentencing and resentencing policies across the country. The variation in resentencing and release mechanisms potentially perpetuate disparities within this population and may have other consequences for the criminal legal system, communities, and providers, including workload and the ability to provide programming and services for reentry needs. This study is the first to document the national landscape of state legislation related to JLWOP sentencing post-Miller and provides lessons for ongoing decarceration and second-look efforts.