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Questions on the Death Penalty

From Emily Garton, Knoxville, TN:

How many people under the age of 18 have been sentenced to death in the US? Has anyone ever been put to death under the age of 18?

Amnesty's death penalty experts respond

Dear Emily,

Actual execution of juvenile offenders in the United States began in 1642, when the state of Massachusetts sentenced to death Thomas Graunger who was 16 at the time of the crime. Since 1642, at least 366 juveniles have been executed, with 22 of these executions occurring during the present era (1973 - 2003). During this era, a total of 225 death sentences have been imposed for crimes committed by offenders who were under the age of 18 at the time of the crime. Of these 225, 150 sentences have been finally resolved, while 75 stay in force and are still being litigated. Of all the resolved death sentences, 85 % have been reversed or commuted. The remaining 22 death sentences (15%) have resulted in execution. The statistics show that of the 22 juveniles executions, Texas has accounted for 13 (59%), Virginia for 3 (14%), and Oklahoma for 2.

The youngest known children executed in the United States were Native Americans. In 1885, the federal government of Arkansas hanged James Arcene, who was 10 years old when he committed the crime. In 1786, the state of Connecticut hanged Hannah Ocuish, who was twelve years old at the time of her crime and execution. In modern times, the youngest known person to be executed in the United States was George Stinney, a fourteen-year-old African-American who was executed by the state of South Carolina in 1944.

It is important to mention that the annual death-sentencing rate for juveniles in the United States has dropped. To illustrate this tendency, while in 1999 there were 15 juvenile death sentences, in 2000 and 2001 only 7 sentences were imposed each year, in 2002 only 4, and just one death sentence has been imposed during the first nine months of 2003.

In the United States during the present era, even though the offenders were sentenced to death for crimes they had committed before they reached the age of 18, none of them was actually executed while still being a teenager. In 1988, the United States Supreme Court ruled in the case of Thompson v. Oklahoma that the execution of people who were under 16 years old at the time of the crime was unconstitutional. One year later, in 1989, in the case of Stanford v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court found that the execution of prisoners for crimes committed when they were 16 or 17 years old was acceptable under the Eight Amendment. However, there are countries in the world that have enforced the death penalty on juveniles under the age of 18. In 1993, Yemen executed a juvenile at the age of 13 (Yemen abolished the death penalty for people under 18 at the time of the crime in 1994). Also in 2000, the Democratic Republic of Congo executed an offender at the age of 14. Among other countries that have put juveniles under the age of 18 to death are Iran and Pakistan.

More Information:

• About the Death Penalty