10-19-2018
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — A 5-4 vote in the Washington Supreme Court barred the state from sentencing 16 and 17-year-old murder defendants to life in prison without parole, saying the sentence violates the state Constitution’s ban on cruel punishment.
In response to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Washington had already severely limited the conditions in which minors could be locked away for life.
This ruling came in response to the case of Brian Bassett, who was convicted in 1996 of three counts of aggravated first-degree murder for shooting his parents and drowning his 5-year-old brother in a bathtub at his home in McCleary when he was 16.