May 7, 2021
Missouri Appeals Court Affirms 17-Year Sentence of Defendant Age 14 At the Time of His Offense
Recent Cases in Law and Neuroscience, Curated by the Center for Law, Brain & Behavior and the Shen Neurolaw Lab with support from the Dana Foundation
A Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed the 17-year sentence of Lamarion Thomas on December 15, 2020. Thomas was 14 years old at the time of his offense; the length of his sentence was greater than his age.
In July 2010, 14-year-old Thomas broke into the home of a 57-year old woman with a knife and raped her. Seven years later, in 2017, DNA from a separate case linked Thomas to the crime. Thomas confessed. Thomas’ case was transferred from the Family Court to a general court because the Family Court determined that Thomas, then 22, “was no longer a proper subject to be dealt with under the Juvenile Code.”
Thomas was charged under a statute which imposes a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years for forcible rape. He was found guilty at trial. During sentencing, Thomas presented evidence of his “difficult and traumatizing childhood.” A forensic psychologist also testified “as to the severe nature of the abuse suffered by [Thomas] and its likely effects on his neurodevelopment.”
Thomas was sentenced to 17 years in prison. The sentencing court stated that it was “a horrific crime” and that “[i]f … someone over the age of 18 committed this crime the sentence would be much greater.” However, the court took noted that it did take into consideration Thomas’ age and did not sentence him to life for this reason.
Thomas appealed, asserting that “the trial court erred in refusing to declare the statutorily mandated 15-year minimum sentence for forcible rape unconstitutional as applied to [him], a juvenile offender” under both the Missouri Constitution and the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Thomas cited the Supreme Court decisions in Roper v. Simmons, Graham v. Florida, and Miller v. Alabama, all providing protections for those under age 18 at the time of their offenses.
Using the reasoning in these decisions, Thomas argued that “all mandatory minimum sentences fail to adequately consider and afford discretion to the attendant circumstances of juvenile offenders and, therefore, must be held unconstitutional.” The Missouri Court of Appeals disagreed, stating that Miller and Graham protect juveniles only from “the harshest possible penalty[,]” which Thomas’ 17-year sentence is not. The appeals court also noted that the sentencing court did consider Thomas’ youth during sentencing. Therefore, the court denied Thomas’ appeal and affirmed his sentence.
Key words: Miller v. Alabama, adolescent brain, mandatory minimum, Missouri
Citation: State v. Thomas, 2020 WL 7349272
This post is the 49th post as part of an ongoing Center for Law, Brain & Behavior (CLBB) series tracking the latest developments in law and neuroscience cases. To see previous posts about recent cases, see the full case archive on the CLBB website. To see updates on legal scholarship, see the Neurolaw News, hosted by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Law and Neuroscience. This project is made possible through support of the Dana Foundation.
