This story was originally published by journalism through MLK50: Justice. Subscribe to their newsletter here.
Teens over the age of 16 who are charged with murder or attempted murder in Tennessee face life in prison due to new “forced transfer” rules alongside the state. Blended Judgment Law.
The rules, which came into effect on January 1, require that older teens charged with murder be transferred to the criminal justice system and be brought to trial as adults.
This policy is the first time for Tennessee. Until recently, young people under the age of 18 remained in the juvenile justice system, except when prosecutors asked juvenile judges to move them into the adult system, according to Jasmine Miller, a senior lawyer at the Youth Law Center. I did.
Approving a judge’s review and transfer “sures that everyone considering transferring to an adult court will provide a separate certification as to whether or not they should be transferred,” Miller said. I did.
A lawmaker who passed the law I want to reduce the “discretion” or decision-making ability of a Tennessee juvenile judge. In fact, juvenile offences have been declining in the state for at least 10 years.
Before the law came into effect, juvenile judges approved the relocation of most young people charged with murder in Tennessee, Miller said. But she said the judges sometimes blocked children from relocating under “extraordinary circumstances.”
Tough crime bills that impose adult writing on a boy is headed to Bill Lee’s desk
These “extraordinary circumstances” include cases where a child is trafficked or abused. Cyntoia Brown. Trafficked as a teenager in Tennessee, Brown killed the man who abused her. She was charged with murder at the age of 16, tried as an adult and sentenced to life in prison.
“Every few years, cases come with people like Sintoia,” Miller said. “Yes, she killed someone, but she was trying to escape from someone who was trafficking her and raping her.”
Brown cases are not uncommon. Some Research It shows that the majority of imprisoned women and girls are sexually abused at some point in their lives.
2022lawmakers requested a juvenile judge to consider whether the youth had been trafficked or abused before approving their transfer to the adult system. However, the state’s forced transfer rules mean that judges cannot stop the transfer of children who have been trafficked or abused in murder cases.
Miller can also claim children for murder, even if they don’t actually kill anyone. In the past, juvenile judges could have stopped these children from being tried as adults. Now they can’t.
For example, a Tennessee teenager could be charged with murder if he shares drugs with a friend who dies from an overdose. The second-degree murder charge for “promoting death from overdose” will pose a minimum sentence of 25 to 40 years, saying “and they must serve 100% of that time.”
Similarly, Tennessee’s “felony murder” rules allow prosecutors to file first-degree murder charges against anyone participating in a felony that leads to someone else’s death. Harrington, executive director of Free Hearts, working with imprisoned women and children in Tennessee.
“If someone is robbed and someone dies (in a group), they could be exposed to felony murder rules,” Harrington said. they. “
The mandatory transfer is a “terrifying idea,” Harrington said. “Don’t you give the judge discretion to look at the individual situation and ask what happened here?”
