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-- Article 24 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) requires children to be protected by their status as minors, and under the UN Convention Against Torture, LWOP amounts to cruel, unusual or degrading treatment.
Introduction
LWOP sentences condemn children to death behind bars, prevent their rehabilitation in society, and violate international laws and norms that prohibit treating them like adults. They're less psychologically and neurologically developed, can't make the same reasoned judgments, and don't understand the long-term consequences of breaking the law.
In adult prisons, they're more vulnerable to physical abuse. Yet many endure it for years "because they have no 'prison experience', friends, companions or social support.' (They're) five times more likely to be sexually assaulted in adult prisons than in juvenile facilities."
One study showed they've been:
"physically and sexually abused, neglected, and abandoned; their parents are prostitutes, drug addicts, alcoholics, and crack dealers; they grew up in lethally violent, extremely poor areas where health and safety were luxuries their families could not afford."
Hopelessness overwhelms them, extinguishing any motivation to develop and mature, reinforced by prison officials providing no education or life skills. As a result, juvenile LWOP is near universally condemned and prohibited, but not in America with at least 2,381 cases (including 149 from 2005 - 2007), and Israel with at least seven.
In both countries, reforms aren't expected despite evidence showing LWOP doesn't deter severe youth crimes, and it's as true for juvenile death penalties. Moreover, the Supreme Court in Roper v. Simmons (2005), reasoned that:
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