SPRINGFIELD — Christopher Carter was 20 when he took part in the murder, armed robbery and kidnapping of a man whose body he helped dispose of on Chicago’s West Side in March 2001.
He was the youngest of three suspects charged in the crime. He argued that his role was comparatively limited and court records suggest that he didn’t commit the actual killing, but at trial testified that he participated in the crime because he was afraid of the two older men. All three were convicted, and Carter was sentenced to 100 years in prison.
More than 20 years into his incarceration, criminal justice reform advocates say Carter is among roughly 1,200 people in prison in Illinois who, under legislation being considered in Springfield, could be eligible for resentencing by a judge who takes into consideration their age and maturity level at the time the crimes were committed.
The proposal would apply to people in prison for crimes they committed when they were under 21. It marks one of the latest efforts by lawmakers to allow retroactive sentencing reforms that would give long-term prisoners, some essentially locked away for life, a chance at freedom.
The bill has offered a glimmer of hope for Carter’s sister, Latarsha Hobbs, who said she talks to her brother, imprisoned in Menard Correctional Center, once or twice a week.
“I would love them to put him back in court and resentenced so he could come out (and see) his family and mother,” Hobbs said. “She’s not getting any younger.”
Last month, the bill, which so far has 27 House Democratic sponsors, passed 7-3 in the House Restorative Justice and Public Safety Committee, an early step in a lengthy legislative process. During the hearing, the bill’s main sponsor, Rep. Theresa Mah, testified that the legislation recognizes “children and young people’s brain development and unique capacity to mature and change.”
“This bill would create a pathway for people sentenced as children and young adults, young people, to show that they have been rehabilitated and return home to give back to their communities,” said Mah, a Chicago Democrat. “This is a fair, cost-effective, age-appropriate way to ensure children and young adults are held accountable for the harm they have caused while offering them an opportunity to redeem themselves.”
Wendell Robinson, executive director of Restore Justice, a criminal justice reform advocacy group that backs the legislation, was implicated in a murder case when he was 17 before being convicted and sentenced to life in prison. After serving more than 25 years behind bars, he was freed because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2012 ruling in Miller v. Alabama that mandatory life sentences in prison without parole for minors violated the U.S. Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
At the March committee hearing, Robinson said the court case enabled him to become an advocate and mentor at Restore Justice and an active member in his church. The proposed legislation would provide similar opportunities for many others, proponents said.
“It’s a lot of people that will do amazing things if given an opportunity,” Robinson testified. “So please know that I’m not exceptional. I’m just an example of what long-term incarceration can look like.”
Republican Rep. Patrick Windhorst, a former state’s attorney in downstate Massac County who voted against the bill, said Illinois already has options for people incarcerated as younger adults to seek early release and that the legislation doesn’t properly look out for victims of these crimes.
“My concern with the resentencing efforts that we’re putting in is that we’re putting more burden, I guess, on victims and victims’ families that they’re going to have to go through this trauma yet once again,” said Windhorst, of Metropolis. “And I think there should be some finality in the court system.”
The Illinois State’s Attorneys Association said it objected to the bill on similar grounds, pointing to an existing statute that “focuses on the individual’s rehabilitation during incarceration.”
“And we believe the Prisoner Review Board is in a better position to make decisions about continued incarceration or release based on those factors than the trial court,” the association said.
Illinois does have other pathways for people in prison to seek early release. They include the governor’s clemency process and post-conviction claims alleging a prisoner’s constitutional rights were violated during their trial. Terminally ill inmates may also be released early. And within the last few years, prosecutors have been allowed to file resentencing petitions to argue that further incarceration is unjust.
Mah’s legislation, however, was recommended in a 2022 report from a legislative resentencing task force composed of lawmakers, legal experts and retired judges. The report urged the legislature to create more resentencing opportunities that are retroactive, including one with criteria similar to what’s in Mah’s bill.
“Age is the strongest predictor of the likelihood of reoffending, thus the term ‘aging out’ of crime,” the task force wrote. “People who committed serious crimes decades ago are not at high risk of doing so again and are less likely to recidivate at all.”
Over the years, Illinois lawmakers have shown reluctance to consider retroactive sentencing reforms. About a decade ago, a member of then-House Speaker Michael Madigan’s leadership team filed legislation to allow certain people who were sentenced to natural life in prison for crimes committed when they were under 25 to file similar petitions for possible resentencing. The measure, which would have been applied retroactively, went nowhere.
This spring’s legislation is an effort to build on sentencing reforms passed by the General Assembly in recent years.
A 2019 law allows people sentenced to lengthy prison terms for most crimes committed when they were under 21 to have their sentence evaluated by the Illinois Prisoner Review Board after serving 10 years. Those convicted of first-degree murder or aggravated criminal sexual assault and not given life sentences would be entitled to parole review after 20 years.
Under a 2023 law, anyone receiving a natural life sentence for a crime committed when they were under 21 — except for those 18 through 20 convicted of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child — would have an opportunity to go before the review board for possible parole after being locked up for 40 years.
Those laws are not retroactive, which the new legislation addresses. In reviewing a prisoner’s petition for early release, judges could reduce a mandatory minimum sentence, or mandatory sentence enhancement, after considering factors including the petitioner’s current age and their “age, impetuosity, and level of maturity at the time of the offense, including the ability to consider risks and consequences of behavior, and any presence of cognitive or developmental disability,” Mah’s bill says.
Judges also could consider whether the petitioner was subjected to outside pressure and whether they were victims of parental neglect, physical, mental or sexual abuse or other childhood trauma.
Victims or their families should be given the opportunity to speak in court or issue a written statement for the judge about the petitioner’s resentencing request, the bill says.
Imprisoned individuals generally could file for release after serving more than 10 years behind bars for most crimes committed when they were 20 or younger, but would have to wait 20 years for review if they’re in custody for first-degree murder and did not receive a sentence of natural life, and 30 years if they were sentenced to natural life.
Springfield Republican Sen. Steve McClure, who has been critical of Democrat-led criminal justice reforms, rejected any suggestion that advancements in what the public knows about brain science should be used as a mitigating factor for all people who’ve been in prison for crimes committed when they were under 21.
“None of those things are excuses to commit brutal murders or rapes, or the types of things that would be eligible for a new sentence under this legislation,” McClure, a former Sangamon County assistant state’s attorney, said in an interview. “We’re not talking about somebody walking into a Walmart and taking five candy bars. We’re talking about somebody that has committed such an egregious, horrific act that they were charged as an adult or they could’ve been 20 years old when they did this, that they were sentenced to a very lengthy sentence and the court would have known the age of the person and sentenced them to a lengthy sentence anyway.”
Sen. Seth Lewis, a Republican from Bartlett, said he wouldn’t support the legislation as written because he questions the provision that allows people incarcerated for most crimes that occurred when they were under 21 to petition the court after serving 10 years.
“An individual who is 18 years old, convicted of a crime, they may have a longer sentence but is now eligible for sentencing review at 28 years old,” Lewis said. “Ten years is just too quick. Twenty? OK, now the person’s older. There’s time for things to settle down.”
But Lewis, who supported an unsuccessful past effort to make certain sentencing reforms retroactive, indicated he supported the provision that allows the courts to field the petitions, saying they’re better equipped to handle that than the under-resourced Prisoner Review Board.
“Many of these individuals have reformed themselves, (and) probably should be afforded the opportunity for the courts to relook at their circumstances,” he said. “Conceptually, it’s not something I’m opposed to.”
Timothy Jones would need to serve about eight more years behind bars before he’d be eligible to petition for a resentencing under Mah’s proposal. But it would shave off a big chunk of his 28-year prison sentence for a conviction under Illinois’ felony murder rule, which held him responsible for the death of a 56-year-old legal assistant because it occurred during the commission of a crime.
Jones was 20 on May 8, 2013, when he led police on a high-speed chase through Chicago’s South Side after taking part in a burglary. During the pursuit, a police SUV struck a car driven by Jacqueline Reynolds, who was killed. Police believed Jones was armed with a gun during the events that led to Reynolds’ death, but no gun was found when he was apprehended.
Reynolds’ family sued the city over her death because of the officers’ actions, and a judge awarded her estate $3.5 million.
Reynolds’ friend LaVonia Noble King had asked the judge to show mercy for Jones, sentenced in 2015, saying police also had responsibility for Reynolds’ death. In an interview with the Tribune, Noble King continued placing blame for the crash on the police, saying Jones was used by authorities as a “scapegoat.”
“He did not hit Jackie. They did. And then they put the whole blame on him,” Noble King said last week. “Jackie would’ve never been OK with that. I’m not OK with that.”
Jones is seeking clemency, and in his petition to the Prisoner Review Board, which was provided to the Tribune by a family friend, he cites a change to the felony murder rule in the sweeping 2021 criminal justice reform bill known as the SAFE-T Act that prevents prosecutors from using the felony murder rule in cases where third parties, such as police officers, intervene in certain crimes and kill someone. This change was not retroactive, however.
Jones also argued he’s a more mature person than he was at the time of the crime.
“I’m in prison where the roughest toughest men are, and I’ve become a peacemaker. I’ve become the guy who gives younger guys advice and let them know it’s OK to be different,” he wrote.
Restore Justice, which is advocating for Christopher Carter, says he is remorseful for the crime that led to his 100-year prison sentence, has mentored a college student and honed his skills in woodworking and craftsmanship during his time in prison.
Carter has a post-conviction claim pending in the Cook County courts arguing that the Miller v. Alabama ruling should be extended to him even if he wasn’t a juvenile at the time of the 2001 murder that sent him to prison. His initial efforts to make that argument were shut down by a Cook County judge before he appealed that ruling and saw it reversed by the state appellate court in 2021.
Efforts to reach the victim’s family were unsuccessful.
Carter has a daughter who is now in her 20s, and if he’s ever set free he plans to reconnect with her, his sister said.
“It would make her happy that she does have a father in her life,” she said.
