People v. Eads

James Gregory Eads was sentenced as an adult in Michigan to 50 to 75 years plus a two-year consecutive term for second-degree murder and possession of a firearm, which was roughly three times the minimum guidelines sentence. Mr. Eads was 16 years old at the time of the offense. His sentence was affirmed on appeal. Twenty-nine years later, Mr. Eads sought leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Michigan, which remanded his case to the Court of Appeals. Building on a series of prior decisions by the Supreme Court of Michigan finding that Michigan’s constitutional prohibition of cruel or unusual punishment affords greater protections to youth than the Eighth Amendment, the Court of Appeals held that Mr. Eads’ sentence violated of the Michigan Constitution.

Juvenile Law Center, the ACLU of Michigan, the ACLU Foundation, and juvenile rights attorney Deborah LaBelle filed an amicus brief in support of Mr. Eads, arguing a 50-to-75-year term of years sentence for an adolescent constitutes cruel or unusual punishment in violation of Article 1, Section 16 of the Michigan Constitution. Our brief argued that sentences beyond life expectancy are unacceptably severe when imposed on adolescents because of their unique capacity for change and their susceptibility to impulsive and risky behavior, particularly in stressful situations. We argued sentences like Mr. Eads’ are unusual because they have become incredibly rare across Michigan and are cruel because they are almost exclusively imposed on Black and Brown youth. Finally, we argued lengthy sentences for adolescents are out of step with the practices of other states, in stark contrast to other nations’ sentencing laws, and do not serve Michigan’s special sentencing goal of rehabilitation. We thus urged the Supreme Court of Michigan to affirm the Court of Appeals’ holding that Mr. Eads’ sentence is cruel or unusual punishment.