Colorado § 16-13-1001 - Legislative declaration.

§ 16-13-1001. Legislative declaration.

(1) The general assembly finds that:

(a) (I) In the 2012 case of Miller v. Alabama, the United States supreme court held that imposing a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole on a juvenile is a cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the eighth amendment to the United States constitution; and

(II) The court further held that children are constitutionally different than adults for purposes of sentencing; and

(b) (I) In the 2016 case of Montgomery v. Louisiana, the court held that Miller v. Alabama announced a substantive rule of constitutional law that applies retroactively; and

(II) In light of the court's holding that children are constitutionally different than adults in their level of culpability, the court further held that prisoners serving life sentences for crimes that they committed as juveniles must be given the opportunity to show that their crimes did not reflect irreparable corruption, and, if they did not, then their hope for some years of life outside prison walls must be restored; and

(III) The court made it clear that a sentence to a lifetime in prison is an unconstitutional sentence for all but the rarest of children.

(2) The general assembly further finds that:

(a) A juvenile sentenced in Colorado for a conviction of a class 1 felony as a result of a direct file or transfer of an offense committed on or after July 1, 1990, and before July 1, 2006, was sentenced to a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole; and

(b) Approximately fifty persons in Colorado received such an unconstitutional sentence.

(3) Now, therefore, the general assembly hereby declares that this part 10 is necessary to provide persons serving such unconstitutional sentences the opportunity for resentencing.

Source: L. 2016: Entire part added, (SB 16-181), ch. 353, p. 1450, § 5, effective June 10.