People v. Czarnecki
Andrew Czarnecki was sentenced to a mandatory life without parole sentence for a crime committed when he was 19 years old.
Juvenile Law Center, The Sentencing Project, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan filed an amicus brief in support of Mr. Czarnecki in the Michigan Supreme Court. Our brief argued that current research supports affording 19-year-olds the same sentencing protections under Miller that the Michigan Supreme Court previously extended to 18-year-olds in People v. Parks, 987 NW2d 161 (2022). We highlighted that 19-year-olds share essentially the same developmental characteristics as 18-year-olds, making them equally less culpable than older adults; that they are likely to desist from crime as they reach their late 20’s and early 30’s; and that mandatory life without parole and other extreme sentences disproportionately harm Black adolescents. We further argued that Michigan, and the rest of the country, already affords numerous special legal protections to older adolescents due to these same developmental characteristics. Accordingly, Mr. Czarnecki’s mandatory life without parole sentence violates the Michigan Constitution’s ban on cruel or unusual punishment (a standard that has been repeatedly found to be broader than the Eighth Amendment).
LEGAL TEAM
Attorneys
Andrew Keats, Marsha Levick, Riya Shah