By DEBRA HAIGHT
BCR Correspondent
Last week’s ruling that a Niles area man convicted of first-degree murder as a juvenile will be resentenced to a term of years has again raised questions about the 2012 and 2016 U.S. Supreme Court decisions that has given the chance of parole and possible freedom for hundreds of juvenile lifers around the country.
The U.S. Supreme Court rulings stated that a life without parole sentence should not be automatic for juveniles convicted of first-degree murder. The court said that mitigating factors such as chronological and emotional age, family and home environment, the circumstances of the crime and the chances for rehabilitation have to be considered.
People have also argued on the other side since then that victims’ rights must also be considered and respected. After the initial Supreme Court ruling in 2012, former Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette urged prosecutors, judges and legislators to ensure that crime victims’ rights are respected.
“I encourage everyone to never lose sight of the victims and families who were permanently damaged by these vicious murders,” he said. “Their loved ones are never coming back.”
He and his staff noted then that the families of many of these crime victims did not register for the Michigan Crime Victim’s Notification Network because the “juvenile lifers” had been sentenced to life without parole in prison.
More recently, an amicus brief filed in the U.S. Supreme Court by the Maryland Crime Victims’ Resource Center made similar points. “Justice is not only due to offenders, but also to the victims harmed by those offenders,” the organization stated.
The ruling released last week by Cass County Circuit Judge Mark Herman centered on the case of Robert Eugene Leamon III, now 43, who has been serving a life without parole prison sentence since 1997.
It was then when he was convicted of the 1993 murder of his pregnant girlfriend, Becky Stowe. Both were students at Brandywine High School near Niles. Leamon denied involvement in her disappearance but was arrested in 1995 for strangling her and burying her in a shallow grave in rural Cass County.
Judge Herman ruled last week that he would not resentence Leamon to another life without parole sentence under the 2012 U.S. Supreme Court ruling and will give him a sentence of a term of years instead. Herman will hand down that sentence at a Jan. 30 hearing in Cass Circuit Court.
The judge’s opinion came after a mid-summer hearing in which Cass County Prosecutor Victor Fitz argued for Leamon be resentenced to life in prison without the chance for parole and defense attorney Sofia Nelson said Leamon is not irredeemable and deserves a chance for parole. Judge Herman denied Fitz’s motion for a life without parole sentence.
Fitz noted that Stowe’s family does not want to see Leamon go free and that an ex-girlfriend fears for her life if he does. He called life without parole a proportionate sentence given the crime.
Several people testified including Leamon himself, an expert witness, Leamon’s family members and the relatives and friends of the victim, Becky Stowe. Leamon’s former girlfriend, Angela Snyder Crocker, was the one who turned Leamon into police and said she feared for her life if Leamon is released.
Judge Herman acknowledged the “horrendous” nature of the crime including Leamon’s premeditation and planning of the murder. “It would be the easiest and safest course for the court to just uphold the original sentence of life without parole based on the horrendous nature of the crime itself,” he wrote.
“To do so however, in the court’s estimation would require that the court also ignore its oath of office and ignore an analysis and consideration of the mitigating factors set out in the Miller and Skinner decisions,” he added.
He called the circumstances of the murder as just one of several factors to be weighed and considered. He noted the testimony offered by expert witness Michael Caldwell who spoke of a juvenile’s immature brain development as well as specific physical traumas suffered by Leamon playing football and in a motorcycle accident.
Herman wrote that he also looked at Leamon’s actions in prison and disagreed with Fitz’s assertion that Leamon was manipulative and acted in anticipation of a Supreme Court ruling on juvenile lifers. The judge wrote that Leamon engaged in programming and rehabilitation in prison long before there was an inkling of a Supreme Court ruling.
Herman also pointed to the testimony of a Michigan Department of Corrections employee who stated that Leamon had not incurred any major misconduct violation over a 22 year period in prison.
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