The the­o­ry of the mod­ern death penal­ty is that it is to be reserved for the ​“worst of the worst” offend­ers. In 2005 the U.S. Supreme Court deter­mined (Roper v. Simmons) that those under age 18 at the time of their crime were less cul­pa­ble than old­er defen­dants and should be exclud­ed from the pos­si­bil­i­ty of exe­cu­tion. However, a recent paper by Hollis Whitson (l.) argued that sci­en­tif­ic research on old­er ado­les­cents implied that the Court’s analy­sis should also apply to those under 21. Whitson cit­ed neu­ro­science research show­ing, ​“that old­er ado­les­cents (includ­ing 18 – 20 year-olds) dif­fer from adults in ways that both dimin­ish their cul­pa­bil­i­ty and impair the reli­a­bil­i­ty of the sen­tenc­ing process.” Moreover, youths under 21 are treat­ed as minors by numer­ous state and fed­er­al statutes, includ­ing liquor laws, inher­i­tance laws, and eli­gi­bil­i­ty for com­mer­cial dri­vers’ licens­es. Another prob­lem high­light­ed in the paper is that minor­i­ty youth suf­fer from the appli­ca­tion of this pun­ish­ment more than white youths. From 2000 to 2014, 60% of those exe­cut­ed for crimes com­mit­ted by 18 – 20 year-olds were racial minori­ties, while only 40% were white. For defen­dants aged 21 and old­er, the reverse was true: 40% of those exe­cut­ed were minori­ties, while 60% were white.

Whitson rec­om­mend­ed fur­ther research on the issue, con­clud­ing, ​“Now it is time for the social sci­en­tists and lawyers to bring their skill to the research effort, and join the work already in progress. Only in this way can we see the day when we can con­sign to the dust­bin of his­to­ry the bizarre prac­tice of exe­cu­tion of per­sons who were but teenagers and youths under the age of 21 at the time of the offense.”

(H. Whitson, ​“The Case Against Execution of People who Were Youths Under the Age of Twenty-One Years Old at the Time of the Offense,” July 2014). Whitson is a part­ner at Samler and Whitson in Denver. See Juveniles, Studies, and Race.

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