Only in Rhode Island

Rhode Island has a very rich history of doing what it wants. It was the first of the 13 Colonies to declare independence from England and it was the last to join the new nation. During Prohibition, we were the state that blatantly ignored the U.S. Government and became home to many large scale bootleggers. Al Capone himself was said to have visited the state to set up operations. I suppose it should come as no surprise then that we are one of only two states where prostitution is legal, and one of very few that allow minors to be strippers.

In Rhode Island, it is not a crime to be a prostitute as long as you solicit indoors. Massage parlors run rampant in the state, and postings on Craigslist are through the roof. Multiple bills have been proposed in the Assembly to eliminate this behavior, but every time they appear, they disappear just as quickly. The arguments vary, but it mostly comes down to this: Why should we outlaw it? Rhode Island prides itself on it's individualism, why should this be any different? And it seems that for now, it isn't.

Rhode Island is also among a handful of states that allow minors 16 or 17 to become exotic dancers. In Rhode Island, you cannot serve alcohol or work construction until you are 18, you can't smoke, and you have to wait until 21 to drink, but you can get on stage and dance for your high school principal as soon as you turn 16... as long as you have working papers and are off stage by 11:30. The main reasoning is that the age of consent in RI is 16, therefore they can legally consent to sexual behavior.

These two RI laws intersect to cause a startling phenomenon... LEGAL teenage prostitution. Because the age of consent in RI is 16, prostitution is legal indoors (often conducted in strip clubs) and minors can perform on stage, this provides the ways and means for teenagers to enter into the world of prostitution. This, to me, is despicable. In what warped sense of right and wrong is it ok for a 16 year old to sell herself to 50 year old men? It is not only disgusting, but in any other state besides Rhode Island, it would be illegal. Only in RI.

Minors in R.I. can be strippers

11:44 AM EDT on Tuesday, July 21, 2009

By Amanda Milkovits
Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE –– Rhode Island teens under 18 can’t work with power saws or bang nails up on roofs.

But dance at strip clubs? Sure. Just as long as the teens submit work permits, and are off the stripper’s pole by 11:30 on school nights.

It’s enough to surprise even those in America’s mecca of striptease and sin –– Las Vegas.

“Everybody buzzes about ‘Nevada and Sin City, tsk, tsk,’ ” said Edie Cartwright, spokeswoman for the Nevada attorney general’s office. “But we regulate it.”

Providence police recently discovered that teen job opportunities extend into the local adult entertainment world while they were investigating a 16-year-old runaway from Boston. The girl told detectives that she worked at Cheaters strip club this spring, and the police got tips about other underage girls working at another club on Allens Avenue.

That’s when the police found that neither state law, nor city ordinance bars minors from working at strip clubs. Those under 18 can’t buy pornography, and no one may take pictures or film minors in sexually suggestive ways. But the law doesn’t stop underage teens from stripping for money. Even if the police saw underage boys or girls on stage at a strip club, they wouldn’t be able to charge them or the club owners with a crime.

“I’ve been doing this a long time,” said youth services Sgt. Carl Weston, “and I can’t find anything that says it’s illegal for a 16-year-old or a 17-year-old to take her top off and dance.”

State law says that anyone who employs a person under 18 for prostitution or for “any other lewd or indecent act” faces up to 20 years in prison and up to $20,000 in fines. But that isn’t enough to prevent underage girls from working in strip clubs, said senior assistant city solicitor Kevin McHugh, who researched the issue a dozen years ago when a teenage dancer was found at a raided strip club.

The term “lewd or indecent” is subjective, McHugh said, and is applied to behavior that’s protected by the First Amendment. “Since we have strip clubs in Providence,” McHugh said, “citizens don’t consider [stripping] lewd.”

With the age of consent at 16 in Rhode Island, the police worry that teenage strippers could take their business to the next level and offer sexual favors –– and it wouldn’t be illegal. State law currently allows indoor prostitution, and two bills intended to ban it have stalled in the General Assembly.

State and federal child labor laws dictate the number of hours and times of days that minors may work, and forbid certain jobs considered to be hazardous. For example, those under 16 can’t work on ladders or pump gas. Youths age 16 and 17 can’t work in manufacturing or excavation.

“Nowhere does it say anything about a kid not being able to strip,” Weston said.

Establishments with city liquor licenses need to keep the teenagers from the booze, but not the stage. “You can’t serve alcohol if you’re under 18,” Weston said, “but you can be the target of a man’s groping hands at age 16.”

But a Rhode Island teen stripper won’t find work in Massachusetts, where state law prohibits anyone from hiring minors under 18 for live performances involving sexual conduct.

Other states have had mixed encounters with the issue.

After a 12-year-old girl was found dancing nude in a club in Dallas last year, the city council swiftly passed rules barring minors from strip clubs and automatically revokes for a year licenses for sex businesses caught employing or entertaining minors.

But an Iowa county judge ruled last year that a striptease by a 17-year-old girl at a strip club was artistic expression protected by the First Amendment. The state attorney general’s office has asked the state Supreme Court to review the ruling.

Nevada, meanwhile, doesn’t let anyone under 18 work in casinos or in public dance halls where there is alcohol — and there are no strip clubs in Nevada without one or the other, or both, said Cartwright, of the attorney general’s office. Minors aren’t even allowed to deliver mail to brothels.

When questioned about Rhode Island’s law, Michael J. Healey, a spokesman for the attorney general’s office, offered a copy of the current state law but did not comment for this article.

But Weston, of the Providence police, was adamant that the law should be changed.

“It leads to a societal breakdown,” he said. “These are just little girls.”

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Shot someone? Get your degree!

All across America, universities and colleges are having their graduations and commencements this weekend. This is a time of celebration and new beginnings for former students, people who are now charged with finding a job in a bleak economy. For many of these people, it is the result of choosing to embark on a journey to get a degree in a field they enjoy, and start on a career they will find fulfilling. But, for one graduate this weekend, it is the result of a court order.

In 2007, at a Halloween party thrown at an Atlanta club, two Morehouse College students had an altercation outside after one of them was thrown out of the club for unruly behavior. The altercation became violent when one of the students, Joshua Brandon Norris, pulled out a gun. The other student, Rashad Johnson, struggled with Norris and the gun went off, hitting Johnson in the leg multiple times. During a plea hearing, Norris plead no contest to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. As part of the agreement, a second charge of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony was dropped, sparing Norris over 20 years in prision. And his sentence? The prosecutor had originally offered a prison term as part of the offer, but apparently had a change of heart. During the sentencing, he instead recommended probation and community service. The judge trusted him, and sentenced Norris to 6 years probation, a $1,000 fine and 240 hours of community service. The strange part of the sentence? The judge also ordered that he remain in college and get his degree.

To me, this seems a bit strange. You shoot a fellow student, take away his chance to ever live a normal life again, and what do you get? A slap on the wrist and a college degree. Johnson will never return to Morehouse College, a school where 3 generations of his family went, all because of a senseless act of violence by another student, and that student gets to finish his time at a prestigeous institute and start a new life for himself. Granted, it will now be on his record that he shot someone, but he still gets that degree that only 27% of the population has in this country. That's saying something about the state of the criminal justice system and the priorities and respect we show the victims of violent crimes, and how we value the rights of the offender over all.


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Japan's Exodus

Oh Japan, when will you learn. In a country where 98.5% of the population is ethnically uniform, any step forward in immigration is a sign of progress. Not only does immigration promote globalization, but it also promotes tolerance and understanding better than any education campaign can. Over the last few years, Japan has seen almost 230,000 Brazilians of Japanese descent pour into the country. And, for the most part, Japan seemed happy to have them. That is, until the economy started to fail the world over and the manufacturing jobs began to falter. Now, Japanese officials have proposed a wide sweeping policy aimed to reduce unemployment. And what is this policy you may ask?

Just recently, Japanese officials have approached all 230,000 workers from Brazil with an offer to pay them to return to Brazil. The government is offering $3000 for the workers and their spouses and an additional $2000 for each defendant towards airfare and other expenses. The catch? They are never allowed to apply for residency in Japan again. They will be allowed to visit on 3 month tourist visas, but above that, they have no options. The worst part is, these workers have limited options. With unemployment at upwards of 4.4% throughout a country of 127 million people, most of those jobs being in manufacturing, many of these workers are currently unemployed, or on the verge of being so. The Japanese government is taking advantage of these people during their time of need, and that smells like nationalism and isolationism to me.

When a country willfully targets citizens of a certain national origin, that speaks volumes about that country's state of mind. Couple that with an already very low immigration rate, and you have a country that does not want to enter the world population. Japan is a country that is historically very isolated. In the 1800's, only 2 nations could trade with them, The Netherlands and China. Until Commodore Perry forced open the door for the US, Japan had no intention of ever changing that policy. After the United States forced open the doors, Japan reluctantly entered the industrial age. Once there, however, they made progress at an amazing rate. They are now one of the leading exporters of motor vehicles, semiconductors and electrical equipment. But they are still closed off. With one of the lowest immigration rates out of any nation, Japan is on a continued path of isolation and discrimination.

Peanut Butter? Everyone's Allergic

A little less than a month ago, the Peanut Corporation of America issued a recall on 21 lots of peanut butter and peanut paste processed at their Blakely, GA plant due to a Salmonella outbreak that effected more than 600 people, and left 9 dead. Three days later, they expanded that recall to cover all peanut products processed at that plant. If that was the end of it, the story would have been sensational. But the story doesn't end there. Earlier today, the Peanut Corporation of America suffered further setback by being forced to issue a recall for all products shipped from their Plainview, Texas plant. This time, the Texas Department of Health discovered dead rodents, rodent excrement and bird feathers in the plant. Throughout all this, the executives at Peanut Corp. have refused to answer questions, even going so far as to plead the fifth at a congressional hearing.

This whole situation speaks volumes about the testing and reporting procedures issued by both state and federal food safety organizations. Under state laws in Georgia, Peanut Corp. was not required to report positive tests for salmonella or other contamination issues to state agencies. That same statue allowed the contamination to go unreported at the federal level as well. What is our government doing if they aren't protecting us? It should be obvious to require companies to report contamination, but it doesn't seem to be that important to regulators. The steps and groundwork are there to provide the system of accountability, but our government is about protecting the corporations, and not the people.

My solution to all this is simple. As one, this country should put it's foot down and say, "No! We will NOT buy your products. As of right now, we all have an allergy to peanut butter. And we are also allergic to any other products that don't report their testing procedures and results. We won't stand for this!" If we all did that as one, situations like this salmonella outbreak, and companies like Peanut Corp. would not be allowed to continue. There would be accountability, and there would be oversight. And, there would be a lot fewer deaths.

Dead rodents, excrement in peanut butter plant lead to recall

(CNN) -- The Texas Department of State Health Services on Thursday ordered the recall of all products ever shipped from the Peanut Corporation of America's plant in Plainview, Texas, after discovering dead rodents, rodent excrement and bird feathers in the plant.

Authorities issued a recall for all peanut products shipped from a plant in Plainview, Texas.

The order, which applies to products shipped since the plant opened nearly four years ago, came a day after the discovery of filth in a crawl space above a production area during a health services inspection, the department said in a news release.

Inspectors also reported that the plant's ventilation system was pulling debris "from the infested crawl space into production areas of the plant resulting in the adulteration of exposed food products," the release said.

Officials at the plant, which opened in March 2005, voluntarily stopped operations Monday night.

Under the order, they are not allowed to resume operations without health services approval.

The company's peanut butter and peanut paste products produced at its plant in Blakely, Georgia, have been linked to a nationwide outbreak of salmonella poisoning that has affected 600 people, killing nine.

A call to the company's telephone number, which was working earlier this week, elicited a recording that said it was no longer in service.

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'Don't Ask, Don't Tell': A Brief History and Viewpoint

The United States military has a long and proud history. In 1776, they fought against great odds and a superior force to win independence from a nation that didn't offer basic rights to their colonies. In 1861, they fought against their brothers and cousins to grant basic freedoms to an entire race of people. In 1941, we fought against an evil dictator and helped liberate a continent and end the tyranny and oppression against many ethnic, religious, and other minority groups. During all these conflicts, the military was segregated, bigoted, or otherwise opposed to varying religions, races or national origins.

Yet, in 1948, President Truman issued Executive Order 9981. This order established equality in the armed forces for all men who served. Later, this was broadened to include female soldiers as well. Even with this executive order on the books however, gay men and women were routinely discriminated against while serving their country. Often times, the discrimination went as high as the President. Up until President Clinton took office in the early 1990's, the authority to ban gays and lesbians from serving in the military resided with the President. When President Clinton took office, he was set to reverse the ban, but during the compromise with opponents that resulted in 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell', Congress took that power from the President and made it into law. This was unprecedented, and a huge setback for the gay rights movement.

Today, 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' is a law that is sporadically enforced at best. As often happens during war time, policies such as these are ignored. Yet, once the fighting subsides, they come to the forefront again. In the current war in Iraq, the first Marine injured has since come out as being a gay man. "It was like carrying this enormous secret that you want to share with someone," Retired Staff Sgt. Eric Fidelis Alva, 36, of San Antonio said in February of 2007. "I eventually formed close bonds with other Marines and did confide in them. They treated me with the same respect and dignity afterward. We were still buddies."

Most Western military forces have now removed policies excluding sexual minority members; of the 26 countries that participate militarily in NATO, more than 20 permit open lesbians, gays, or bisexuals to serve. This is supported by recent surveys which show an overwhelming support across the nation, and even in the armed forces, to repeal 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell'. In a recent poll, as many as 1 in 4 troops know of at least one gay or lesbian member serving with them, and many found out from that person directly (Source). Of those surveyed, the majority harbored no ill will or felt any apprehension against serving with those members. This speaks volumes. It also shows how disconnected the Brass is with their soldiers. While serving as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Peter Pace stated, "I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts." This was said in support of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell', and it highlights just how far removed many of the leaders of the armed forces are. But, not all of the leaders feel this way. Retired Army general John Shalikashvili, who served as chairman after General Colin Powell, also wants it removed from the books.

Personally, I'd like to see 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' removed, and quickly. While I have faith that it will be repealed during President Obama's term, I won't hold my breath.

Reexamining "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"

By Mark Thompson/Washington Tuesday, Mar. 13, 2007

Amid the turmoil of the Iraq war and the scandal at Walter Reed, the last thing the nation's top military officer should want to do is generate more controversy by renewing the debate over gays in the military. Yet that's just what Marine General Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has done in an interview with the Chicago Tribune, telling the paper that "I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts."

His comments have not surprisingly sparked a flurry of criticism from gay advocacy groups and lawmakers, but they are unlikely to change the status quo. Ultimately, many military officers believe, openly gay men and women will be allowed to serve in uniform, but it's just not going to happen very quickly. And for that, ironically, you can blame the most gay-friendly President ever: Bill Clinton.

Prior to Clinton taking office, the rule barring gays from serving was set solely by the President — and could be lifted by him, or her, as well. But once Clinton came in pledging to lift the ban, the opposition of his chairman of the Joint Chiefs — Colin Powell — and the hapless efforts by his first defense secretary, the late Les Aspin — ignited a firestorm on Capitol Hill. As the "don't ask, don't tell" compromise was hammered out, Congress took the extraordinary step of removing the policy from the President's hands and writing it into law.

"General Pace1s comments are outrageous, insensitive and disrespectful to the 65,000 lesbian and gay troops now serving in our armed forces," says C. Dixon Osburn, who heads the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a gay advocacy group in Washington (the 65,000 estimate is a UCLA study's estimate, the group said). "Our men and women in uniform make tremendous sacrifices for our country, and deserve General Pace's praise, not his condemnation. As a Marine and a military leader, General Pace knows that prejudice should not dictate policy. It is inappropriate for the Chairman to condemn those who serve our country because of his own personal bias. He should immediately apologize for his remarks." Tuesday afternoon, Pace stuck to his guns but backed away a bit from the morality angle. "I should have focused more on my support of the policy," he said in a statement, "and less on my personal moral views."

Three weeks ago, the first Marine seriously injured in Iraq declared he was gay and called for "don't ask, don't tell" to be tossed out. Retired Staff Sgt. Eric Fidelis Alva, 36, of San Antonio, lost his right leg to a land mine in the war's opening days. His wound got him a Purple Heart from President Bush, as well as a profile in People magazine and an appearance on the Oprah Winfrey Show. "It was like carrying this enormous secret that you want to share with someone," he said last month. "I eventually formed close bonds with other Marines and did confide in them. They treated me with the same respect and dignity afterward. We were still buddies." A 2005 study by the Government Accountability Office showed that about 10,000 service personnel have been discharged since the policy took effect, including 54 Arabic specialists.

Alva is not alone. Senator Hillary Clinton, who was first lady when Congress wrote "don't ask, don't tell" into law, wants it repealed. Retired Army general John Shalikashvili, who served as chairman after Powell, also wants it removed from the books. But far more important is the view from the ranks. A recent poll by the Military Times newspapers showed that only 30 percent of respondents think openly gay people should be allowed to serve, compared to 59 percent who are opposed. Until those numbers are reversed, "don't ask, don't tell" won't change.

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US Education: What a Joke

As a citizen of the United States, I'm proud to live in a country where we are granted certain inalienable rights. The right to assemble, the right to free speech, the right to prevent unlawful searches, and the right for freedom of religion. But the right to a free education? Well, we have it, but is it worth it? In this country, I'd say no.

Across the planet, every nation has some standard of education. Every place varies in one way or another, but every country agrees that it is important enough to be mandatory for children. That is true. Without a basic education for it's populace, a country could not function. But how much money a nation pours into education, and the requirements to graduate, varies greatly depending on where you look. In some nations, like France, the Federal government pours almost $100 Billion (USD) into education. Other nations, such as India, contribute just over $9 Billion (USD) to their education system. And The US? Well, we fall somewhere in the middle, with approximately $70 Billion. By many standards, that's not a small amount. But, when you consider that the US has about 5 times as many people living here, that number makes less of an impact.

Consider this. In the United States, educational budgets have become stagnant in recent years, yet costs have risen. This means that more and more districts are in the red, and are having to make drastic cuts to their budget, or forgo purchasing up to date equipment or books. Many school districts are using older editions of books that have changed greatly in recent years, especially in the realm of science. This is causing our country to fall behind others in the science and technology sectors, which are the fastest growing sectors on the planet. And what do we do about it?

Recently, President Obama recently proposed a huge stimulus package to jump start the economy. It would have given boosts to businesses who created new jobs, lessened the tax burdeon on many Americans, not just the rich, and it would have given almost $70 Billion to the education system. But do you think it could pass the first time around? Of course not. And what was cut? The education budget of course. As one republican opponent said, “I love schools; I love children,” but continues to state that education boosts “don’t belong in this bill.” Really? Because I tend to disagree. The only way this economy can rebound is to bring some of those high-paying tech jobs back to the United States from overseas. And, without an adequately funded education system, we have no hope of acheiving that.

Throwing schools out the window

By Nicholas Kristof

So this is what the Senate seems to be coming down to: keeping bridges and throwing students out the window. The effort to prune the stimulus package to make it more palatable to Republicans is focused on slashing money for education.

The proposed cuts, by various accounts, include $40 billion to help states (in large part with education budgets), possibly $14 billion for Pell grants, and $14 billion for other education programs (though late word from the Washington Post is that the Pell grants may have survived). The argument is that these would be ongoing programs, not a short-term stimulus, and conservatives are very wary of expanding education programs in ways that will increase the federal presence in the education space or the burden on taxpayers. They particularly don’t want Headstart and school construction in the stimulus. Mel Martinez says: “I love schools; I love children,” but he adds that such measures “don’t belong in this bill.”

He’s wrong, for a couple of reasons. First, the priority has to be to get the stimulus passed, and it’s better to err on the side of a big stimulus than a small one. I lived in Japan from 1995 through 1999 and saw how crucial it is for a government to act decisively – and, rather like Colin Powell’s doctrine of “overwhelming force” – with real power in confronting an economic crisis. Tim Geithner, Ben Bernanke and Larry Summers were all close students at the time of Japan’s mess, and that’s why they’re all determined to get enough of a stimulus and avoid a lost decade. And constructing schools or paying Headstart teachers delivers just as much economic stimulus as a new bridge or road; indeed, the economic multiplier effect is probably greater in low-income communities than in America as a whole.

Second, I’m increasingly of the view that our nation’s top priority — which I used to think was a national health care system — must be revitalizing our education system. The good suburban schools are great, and do just as well as Singapore’s or Hong Kong’s. But our inner city schools are a disaster, and they fail the students and our country’s economic future.

My thinking shifted partly after reading The Race Between Education and Technology, by Claudia Goldin and Lawrence Katz, one of last year’s most important books. As I wrote at the time, they argue that the central reason America became the most important economy in the world was its emphasis on broad education, at a time when Europe educated only the elites. Yet that edge has disappeared, and America is the only country today where parents are more likely to graduate from high school than their children. If we want to maintain America’s economic greatness, then we need roads and bridges, yes, but we also need a more educated work force.

Come on, senators, education is the best way to fight poverty, the best way to break the cycle of the underclass, the best way to ensure a broader distribution of opportunity in America, the best way to preserve our country’s economic competitiveness. And it’s just as good for stimulus purposes as repaving a road — and you still want to throw those school children out the window?

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Why This Country is Backwards

This country has it's priorities backwards. Not only do we imprison more juveniles than any other nation, but we do it for LONGER than any other nation. Out of the 195 countries on the planet, we are the only one that imprisons CHILDREN for life without parole. That, to me, is ridiculous. We don't allow children to see violent movies, we don't allow them to smoke, we don't allow them to vote, and we don't allow them to have sex. Why is this? Because their mental capacities are less than adults, or so say many experts and the government. Their sense of right and wrong is inhibited, and their ability to realize their mistakes is lowered. Again, this is according to experts and the government. Then why does this same government allow children to be put away for life without parole? Children are still pliable. They are learning, and they are able to be influenced. Out of all criminals, children have the best hope of being rehabilitated. That is what we should be doing, rehabilitating them and teaching them. Instead of spending the money to incarcerate them, teach them and make them better people. Don't put them with felons who will do the opposite. All that does is create more victims, both their future victims, AND the children.

The situation is further compounded when the offender is African American. That is the great irony of the justice system. Justice is supposed to be blind, but frequently it is not. If you are African American, you're in trouble. It's not right, and it shouldn't be allowed, but it frequently is. Tell me this. How is a one day trial resulting in a 13 year old African American boy going to prison for life fair or just? Answer: It isn't. In this instance the lawyer was disbarred, but that is frequently not the case. Honestly, the kid was convicted based off a 72 year old woman's memory. That alone speaks volumes.

Defining ‘Cruel and Unusual’ When Offender Is 13

In 1989, someone raped a 72-year-old woman in Pensacola, Fla. Joe Sullivan was 13 at the time, and he admitted that he and two older friends had burglarized the woman’s home earlier that day. But he denied that he had returned to commit the rape.

The victim testified that her assailant was “a colored boy” who “had kinky hair and he was quite black and he was small.” She said she “did not see him full in the face” and so would not recognize him by sight. But she recalled her attacker saying something like, “If you can’t identify me, I may not have to kill you.”

At his trial, Mr. Sullivan was made to say those words several times.

“It’s been six months,” the woman said on the witness stand. “It’s hard, but it does sound similar.”

The trial lasted a day and ended in conviction. Then Judge Nicholas Geeker, of the circuit court in Escambia County, sentenced Mr. Sullivan to life without the possibility of parole.

Mr. Sullivan is 33 now, and his lawyers have asked the United States Supreme Court to consider the question of whether the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment extends to sentencing someone who was barely a teenager to die in prison for a crime that did not involve a killing.

According to court papers and a report from the Equal Justice Initiative, which now represents Mr. Sullivan, only eight people in the world are serving sentences of life without parole for crimes they committed when they were 13. All are in the United States.

And there are only two people in that group whose crimes did not involve a killing. Both are in Florida, and both are black.

On the other hand, the question of whether life without parole for juveniles is constitutional is the logical next step following the court’s 2005 decision in Roper v. Simmons, which struck down the death penalty for crimes committed by 16- and 17-year-olds. Writing for the majority in that case, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said that even older teenagers are different from adults. They are less mature, more impulsive, more susceptible to peer pressure and more likely to change for the better over time.

Mr. Sullivan’s trial, for instance, lasted a day. He was represented by a lawyer who made no opening statement and whose closing argument occupies about three double-spaced pages of the trial transcript. The lawyer was later suspended, and the Florida Bar’s Web site says he is “not eligible to practice in Florida.”

There was biological evidence from the rape, but it was not presented at the trial. When Mr. Sullivan’s new lawyers recently sought to conduct DNA testing on it, they were told that the state had destroyed it in 1993.

“I don’t think it’s possible to say that a 13-year-old will never change and that life without parole is an appropriate punishment,” Mr. Stevenson said.

Aside from Mr. Sullivan’s case, it seems there is only one other appeals court decision about whether young teenagers may be locked away forever for rape. It was issued 40 years ago in Kentucky, and it involved two 14-year-olds. The court struck down the part of the sentences precluding the possibility of parole.

Juveniles “are not permitted to vote, to contract, to purchase alcoholic beverages or to marry without the consent of their parents,” the court said. “It seems inconsistent that one be denied the fruits of the tree of the law, yet subjected to all of its thorns.”

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