Or “fortunately”, if you care at all about public safety . . . .

In sum, I disagree with you, Gideon, and agree with the court (?!) that Roper doesn’t get us where we need to be. In Roper, the penalty of death was a critical factor to the outcome of the case. The Court overruled its prior decision on the issue for two main reasons. The consensus was now different – most states didn’t allow for the execution of juvenile offenders and even fewer had carried out such an execution; and death is different.

Here, we don’t have death, so we’re already behind because we’re talking about a punishment that is less cruel. It also doesn’t appear that the court was presented with any hard data or argument as to why or how these punishments (LWOP or man. min. sentences) offend our evolving standards of decency, i.e., evidence that our society opposes these punishments for juvenile offenders, the number of states that don’t allow for these punishments for juvenile offenders, etc. If we’re only left with a policy argument about why we shouldn’t have these rigid and harsh punishments for juveniles, I agree with the court that it is a matter for the legislature.

I agree wholeheartedly with your policy argument (and the ones that were seemingly presented in the two CT cases), but, unfortunately, that alone doesn’t give rise to a violation of the 8th Amendment.

There are two means of capacitating killers–execution and LWOP (with LWOP being an imperfect means of doing so–too bad so sad for any prison guards or other inmates). Roper took execution off the table for juveniles (an appalling and lawless decision); it said nothing about the other means of incapacitance, i.e., imprisonment. That’s why that tired, trite and sloganeering-substituting-for-analysis phrase “death is different” actually makes sense here. Roper took away the state’s power to execute heinous killers like Christopher Simmons–it left the state’s other means to incapacitate them intact.

Your analysis is far too criminal-centered. You forget about society’s need for protection from the murderer and it’s need for deterrence, both of which would be adversely affected by such a result.

I cannot leave without mentioning this statement:

“By mandating that a juvenile automatically be sentenced to 25 years, we are snuffing out any chance at rehabilitation; any glimmer of hope that the adolescent mind grows and learns and can become a contributing member of society is snuffed. Much like the life that the juvenile took away, his life will also be wasted.”

Cry me a river.