Commonwealth v. King

Ivory King was initially sentenced to life without parole for offenses he committed as a youth. Following the U.S. Supreme Court decisions in Miller v. Alabama and Montgomery v. Louisiana, Mr. King was resentenced to four 20-to-life sentences (an aggregate of 80 years to life), which amounts to a de facto life without parole sentence. 

Juvenile Law Center and the Defender Association of Philadelphia filed an amicus brief in the Superior Court of Pennsylvania in support of Mr. King, arguing that his de facto life sentence is both unconstitutionally disproportionate under the Eighth Amendment and unconstitutionally cruel under the Pennsylvania Constitution. We further urged the Court to reinstate the procedural protections previously set forth by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in Commonwealth v. Batts.

The Superior Court of Pennsylvania held that Mr. King’s four sentences must be considered individually, not in the aggregate, and thus do not constitute a de facto life without parole sentence. The Court further held that, even if the sentence was a de facto life sentence, it would not violate the Eighth Amendment, as it was the product of a discretionary sentencing system. 

Mr. King appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Juvenile Law Center and the Defender Association of Philadelphia filed an amicus brief in support of Mr. King’s petition. We urged the court to grant review, arguing that Pennsylvania Constitution, which was not intended by the Framers to be coextensive with the Eighth Amendment, finds a punishment that is not necessary to deter or reform as cruel. We further argued that a life without parole sentence, or its de facto equivalent, is cruel and therefore unconstitutional when imposed on an individual who was a child at the time of sentencing, whose crime reflects transient maturity, and who has a capacity for rehabilitation.

After the Supreme Court granted review, Juvenile Law Center, acting as co-counsel for Mr. King along with the Defender Association and lawyers from Greenberg Traurig LLP, filed Mr. King’s merits brief with the Supreme Court arguing that Pennsylvania’s state constitutional prohibition on “cruel” punishment is broader than the Eighth Amendment and prohibits any life or de facto life sentence, including as a result of sentence stacking, where the appellant has been found by the court to be rehabilitated and matured.

Legal Team

Attorneys

Tiara Greene, Marsha Levick, Riya Shah, Hannah Stommel

Paralegals 

Tiffany Faith, Marissa Lariviere