From death to near-death: The fate of serious youthful offenders after Roper v. Simmons.

This review of the juvenile death penalty - its history, impact, and extinction – does not end with the 2005 Roper decision. While the abolishment of life-ending sentences for adolescent offenders is no longer an option for judicial officers, its punitive paradigm has been far-reaching, and its alternative – life without the possibility of parole – much more common. This paper is in two-parts: 1) the analysis of the recent juvenile death penalty era (1976 to 2005) and federal and Supreme Court doctrine that eventually ended executions; and, 2) post-Roper, the continued dismal state for serious youthful offenders, most who suffer from significant disabilities, trauma, and education deficits, with thousands sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. This country has shifted from the juvenile death penalty era to the juvenile near-death penalty era.