{
  "id": "RS21969",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "RS21969",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 302075,
      "date": "2005-03-09",
      "retrieved": "2016-04-07T19:51:10.494029",
      "title": "Capital Punishment and Juveniles",
      "summary": "In  Roper v. Simmons , 543 U.S. ____ (2005), the United States Supreme Court held\nthat the Eighth\nand Fourteenth Amendments forbid imposition of the death penalty on offenders who were under\nthe age of 18 at the time of the offense. In deciding  Roper , the Court was not writing\non a clean\nslate. In 1988, in  Thompson v. Oklahoma , 487 U.S.  815 (1988), the Court struck down\nthe death\npenalty for juvenile offenders under the age of 16. The Court last reviewed the issue in 1989, when\nits decision in  Stanford v. Kentucky , 492 U.S.  361 (1989) set the minimum eligibility\nage for the\ndeath penalty at 16, finding that there was not a national consensus against the execution of those\naged 16 or 17 at the time of the offense. Since 1989, eight states have established a minimum age\nof 18, raising the total number of states that ban juvenile executions to 30. The  Roper \nCourt found\nthat the \"evolving standards of decency,\" which led the Court in  Atkins v. Virginia , 536\nU.S.  304\n(2002), to ban the execution of mentally retarded people are similar with respect to juveniles. The\n Roper  decision overrules the Court's prior decision in  Stanford . The\nimmediate effect of this\ndecision is to end the execution of juveniles throughout the U.S., regardless of state law.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "American Law"
  ]
}