Prison Radio Audio Feed

"Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Juvenile Lifer Initiative excels under Robert Hammond," by Kerry Shakaboona Marshall. One of the most successful projects by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections in the past decade has to be the Juvenile Lifers Initiative established by Department of Corrections Secretary John Wessel and managed by Robert Hammond, Staff Assistant to the Deputy Secretary. The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections Juvenile Lifers Initiative was established in response to Miller v. Alabama, a United States Supreme Court case ruling that mandatory life without parole sentences for child offenders convicted of homicide to be unlawful. At that time, the Juvenile Lifers Initiative sought to provide parole-mandated rehabilitation programming and family reunification day to juvenile lifer prisoners. The United States Supreme court then ruled in the case of Montgomery vs. Louisiana that the Miller holding is to be retroactively applied to all juvenile lifers in the country. At which time t