This study describes how judges in Maricopa County, Arizona responded to age and other mitigation evidence in imposing “life” versus “natural life” sentences for juvenile offenders convicted of homicide in pre-Miller cases. Maricopa County was selected for this case study because of its history of adhering to “restrictive interpretations” of various kinds of mitigation evidence and because of the characteristics of this county’s local court community. The study employed a mixed-methods design consisting of a content analysis of relevant case documents and a quantitative analysis of the findings from the qualitative analyses of legal case documents. It examined 82% of the juveniles given natural life sentences and 72% of the juveniles given a sentence of life (25-to-life) in Maricopa County. The findings of this study indicated that judges referenced age as a statutory mitigating factor in 17% of both “life” and “natural life” cases, and age as a reason for the sentences imposed in 46% of both “life” and “natural life” cases. However, the age-relevant and other mitigating reasons referenced by judges lacked statistically significant associations with the sentences that the judges imposed. The only judicial reason with a statistically significant association with the imposed sentences was “emotional impact of the crime on the victim’s family.” The implications of this and other findings for “full responsibility” and “mitigation” approaches for blaming juvenile lifers were discussed, as well as the need for future research on post-Miller sentencing and resentencing processes.

Cite as: José B. Ashford, Katherine Puzauskas & Robert J. Dormady, Judicial Responses to Age and Other Mitigating Evidence: An Exploratory Case Study of Juvenile Life Sentences in Pre-Miller Cases, 112 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 593 (2022).

这项研究描述了亚利桑那州马里科帕县的法官如何回应年龄和其他减轻证据，对在米勒前案件中被判犯有杀人罪的少年犯判处“终身”与“自然终身”判决。之所以选择马里科帕县进行本案例研究，是因为该县一直坚持对各种缓解证据进行“限制性解释”，而且该县当地法院社区的特点。该研究采用混合方法设计，包括对相关案件文件的内容分析和对法律案件文件定性分析结果的定量分析。它检查了马里科帕县 82% 的被判处自然无期徒刑的青少年和 72% 的被判处无期徒刑（25 至终身）的青少年。这项研究的结果表明，在“生命”和“自然生命”案件中，有 17% 的法官将年龄作为法定减刑因素，而在“生命”和“自然生命”案件中，46% 的法官将年龄作为判处刑罚的原因。生活”的案例。然而，法官引用的与年龄相关的和其他减轻处罚的理由与法官判处的判决缺乏统计学上的显着关联。与判处的刑罚有统计学意义的唯一司法原因是“犯罪对受害者家庭的情感影响”。讨论了这一发现和其他发现对指责未成年人的“完全责任”和“减轻”方法的影响，以及未来对米勒后量刑和重新量刑过程的研究的必要性。

引用为：José B. Ashford、Katherine Puzauskas 和 Robert J. Dormady，对年龄和其他减轻证据的司法回应：对 Pre-Miller 案件中少年无期徒刑的探索性案例研究，112 J. Crim。L. & 犯罪学 593 (2022)。