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The right decision on the juvenile death penalty.

Article Excerpt
In Roper v. Simmons, (1) the Supreme Court reversed a 1989 precedent (2) and struck down the death penalty for crimes committed by people under age 18. Although the Court's claim that standards of decency have evolved significantly in that period is less than compelling, the result seems right.

The majority reached its conclusion in the face of a heinous murder, but that is probably because it takes a particularly compelling case for a jury to sentence a juvenile to death. When Christopher Simmons was 17, he started talking about wanting to murder someone. On several occasions he discussed a plan--to commit a burglary, then tie up the victim and push him or her from a bridge--with his friends. He said they could "get away with it" because they were minors. (3)

Following this plan, he and a younger friend broke into the home of Shirley Crook. They bound and blindfolded her with duct tape and drove her to a state park. There they walked her to a railroad trestle, tied her hands and feet with electrical wire, covered her whole face with duct tape, and threw her into the river, where she drowned.

Because Simmons later bragged about the murder, the crime was not difficult to solve. Once in custody, he confessed and performed a videotaped reenactment of the crime. (4) As a consequence, the guilt phase of the trial in Missouri state court was uncontested.

At the penalty phase, both sides brought up Simmons's age--the defense attorney arguing that he should not receive an adult sentence (meaning death) because he was not old enough to drink, serve on juries, or...

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