Created through a collaboration between the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY) and Baker McKenzie, this report highlights the experiences and perspectives of community members impacted by youth violence, including those who have survived it and those who have lost loved ones. Survivors are not a monolith, and there is no single “right” response to tragedy.
Not a Monolith: Perspectives from survivors of youth violence
While public narratives often amplify calls for punitive policies and lengthy prison sentences, the views of many survivors in the CFSY community run counter to this representation. Survivors in our community and across the country are leading the effort to expand accountability beyond incarceration, center healing, and create meaningful pathways to redemption. This report reflects the voices and lived experiences of the survivors who contributed to this effort, while honoring the broader diversity of perspectives survivors hold about justice, safety, and healing.
We are grateful to partner with such incredible individuals in our fight for justice, and we are honored to play even a small role in the healing journeys of so many. We hope you read the experiences in this report with respect and care. -Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth
Preface
56%
of surveyed crime victims prefer political candidates who support shorter prison sentences and would use the money saved for youth violence and treatment programs over a candidate who supports long sentences.
-Alliance for Safety and Justice. (2024). Crime Survivors Speak: A National Survey of Victims’ Views on Safety and Justice.
Since its founding, the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY) has been shaped by the voices of those who have lost loved ones to youth violence and who are survivors of youth violence themselves. Survivors are key members of the CFSY community, informing our organizational mission and leading advocacy efforts to ensure survivors are treated with the utmost respect and care in the criminal legal system, to promote age-appropriate accountability for children who commit harm, and to create opportunities for community healing. We are honored to know the people featured in this report, who are members of CFSY’s National Family Network (NFN), a community of people who have been impacted by youth violence including those who have lost loved ones or are loved ones of youth that have caused harm, and our Incarcerated Children’s Advocacy Network (ICAN), a group of people who were sent to prison as children and have since returned home after serving extreme sentences. The varied life experiences of the survivors featured in this report demonstrate that there is no “right” way to be a survivor, and that no single experience can represent all people who experienced harm.
Introduction
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Survivors
With pro bono support from
In a system where surviving family members like myself have to chart our own paths, the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY) has provided support for people like me who are so often left without community. The CFSY is unique in its ability to bring together people who are directly impacted by the criminal legal system, whether they lost a loved one, were sent to prison as a child, or simply want to change the system as it stands. I have been blessed to meet people with different experiences than my own who have brightened my own life due to my involvement with the CFSY, and I encourage others to do the same. I first became connected with the CFSY over a decade ago when I was advocating for restorative justice legislation in my home state of Colorado. My local and national work has continued to this day, including through my nonprofit organization, the Colorado Crime Survivors Network (CCSN), which currently serves 150 families per year. We provide supportive services across Colorado, including a program called “5280 Survivors” that provides direct services to parents like myself who have lost children to violence. In my community, I also lead initiatives including gun buy-back programs and supporting young incarcerated people through victim and offender programs. Our organization spearheads Colorado's first “HIP” (Hand Gun Intervention Program) with Denver's Juvenile Probation Department and District Attorney’s Office, through which youth receive a second chance after completing weeks of educational, conflict resolution programming that aims to prevent violence. The results are phenomenal. I continue to seek reform in our criminal legal system throughout the country, and to speak with prosecutors and others who have the power to make our system more supportive of victims and rehabilitative for people who cause harm, particularly through restorative justice. I believe it is imperative that we continue advocating for change on the national level, as change is not something that happens all at once. We all must do our part to create the change we want to see in this world. There is much work to be done to support people like myself who lost loved ones to youth violence. But to begin that work, we need the world to understand that we, as survivors, are not a monolith. We all have unique perspectives, and too often the perspectives of those of us who support mercy and redemption are left out of the conversation. I am proud to stand with the CFSY as they work to support survivors, and I hope you will read our perspectives by engaging with this report. If you are reading this as someone who lost a loved one and are wondering where to turn, please know that you are not alone and that there is a community for you. Respectfully, Sharletta Evans Executive Director, Colorado Crime Survivors Network Member of the CFSY National Family Network (NFN)
On December 21, 1995, my life was forever changed when I lost my 3-year-old son Casson to violence at the hands of three teenagers. After reports of drive-by shootings by rival gangs in my niece’s neighborhood, I drove to her home to pick up her child and ensure they were safe. I drove there with my son Casson in the backseat, and when I went inside, I left him in my car with his older brother and 22-year-old cousin for what I thought would be a moment. Yet as I entered the home, gunfire erupted outside. Casson was tragically killed in the crossfire after a bullet pierced the side window of my car. He died in my arms. The pain of that experience is something I carry with me to this day. As I grieved Casson’s passing, the legal system pressed forward. Within 9 months from the time the shooting happened, two of the boys were convicted and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. I was forced to confront the reality of how our criminal legal system responds to people like myself who have lost loved ones – and how children that caused harm are treated. Today, I believe that life-without-parole sentences for children are extreme, unproductive, and leave no room for the possibility that a child who makes a mistake could change later in life. We all deserve mercy and the opportunity for a second chance, and in some cases, a first chance at life and freedom. Today, I’m an advocate for restorative justice and creating pathways for redemption for people – particularly children – who harm others. One of the teenagers who caused the death of my son was released from prison in 2021, and after establishing a relationship with him over many years, today I am proud to consider him my son. While you can hear more about my healing journey inside this report, my experience is shared by many others. People who have lost loved ones to youth violence often seek healing by communicating with the people who played a role in causing trauma in their lives, and in many cases, we arrive at the conclusion that forgiveness is a critical component of healing. But all too often, we have people in our lives who do not support healing journeys that involve mercy and redemption for people who have caused harm. To make matters worse, media featuring people who have lost loved ones to violence disproportionately highlights individuals who support punitive policies and retribution. As a result, many people never encounter survivors like me who speak out in favor of mercy, redemption, and second chances for people convicted in cases involving violence, even as many of us share this belief.
In 2012, I chose to meet face-to-face with the main shooter who took my son’s life. It was this decision that allowed me to find real healing and caused me to change my perspective on how our system punishes children."
Since its founding, the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY) has been shaped by the voices of those who have lost loved ones to youth violence and who are survivors of youth violence themselves. Survivors are key members of the CFSY community, informing our organizational mission and leading advocacy efforts to ensure survivors are treated with the utmost respect and care in the criminal legal system, to promote age-appropriate accountability for children who commit harm, and to create opportunities for community healing. We are honored to know the people featured in this report, who are members of (1) CFSY’s National Family Network (NFN), a community of people who have been impacted by youth violence including those who have lost loved ones or are loved ones of youth that have caused harm, and (2) our Incarcerated Children’s Advocacy Network (ICAN), a group of people who were sent to prison as children and have since returned home after serving extreme sentences. The varied life experiences of the survivors featured in this report demonstrate that there is no “right” way to be a survivor, and that no single experience can represent all people who experienced harm. Survivors are not a monolith. While survivors are frequently portrayed as being uniformly in support of punitive sentences and policy, the experiences of many survivors in our community run counter to this representation. Across the country, victims of crimes frequently support rehabilitation over punishment, restorative approaches to accountability, and research-driven public safety measures that can truly disrupt cycles of harm and violence. This matters because communities are safest when cycles of harm are interrupted, not repeated. This is especially critical given that people who have caused harm are disproportionately likely to have experienced harm directly or through harm to their loved ones. Facts on victims of violent crime: In the 2024 National Survey of Victims’ Views, 56 percent of surveyed crime victims preferred political candidates who supported shorter prison sentences and would use the money saved for youth violence and treatment programs over a candidate who supported long sentences.1 Children who commit acts of violence are also frequently victims of violent crime themselves – in one study, youth who were the victims of a violent offense were three times more likely to commit a violent offense in the next twelve months than those who were not victims.2 Members of our Incarcerated Children’s Advocacy Network (ICAN), a group of people who were sent to prison as children and have since returned home after serving extreme sentences, were often victims of violent crime before going to prison.3 When violent crimes occur, police are less likely to solve cases with a Black victim.4 It is also important for us to recognize that violence is often concentrated in communities that have been historically under-resourced and overexposed to harm, including many communities of color. While you will find incredibly varied and diverse perspectives and reflections on the experience of being a survivor and on the experience of engaging with survivors in this report, we also must recognize the disparate impact of violence stemming from decades of systemic racism that extends far beyond our criminal legal system. While survivors have endured deeply painful and life-altering tragedies, their identities are shaped by their strength, resilience, and healing—not just by their traumas. In this report, we highlight the experiences of a segment of our survivor community, including those who have survived acts of violence and those who have lost loved ones to violence. We are incredibly grateful to those who have been willing to share their inspiring stories of strength, hope, and incredible resilience by sharing their perspectives through interviews and written accounts in this report.
I first became connected with the CFSY over a decade ago when I was advocating for restorative justice legislation in my home state of Colorado. That work has continued to this day through my nonprofit organization, the Colorado Crime Survivors Network (CCSN), which currently serves 150 families per year. We provide supportive services across Colorado, including a program called “5280 Survivors” that provides direct services to parents like myself who have lost children to violence. In my community, I also lead initiatives including gun buy-back programs and supporting young incarcerated people through victim and offender programs. To this day, I continue to seek reform in our criminal legal system and to speak with prosecutors and others who have the power to make our system more supportive of victims and rehabilitative for people who cause harm, particularly through restorative justice. We all must do our part to create the change we want. There is much work to be done to support people like myself who lost loved ones to youth violence, but to begin that work, we need the world to understand that we are not a monolith. We all have unique perspectives, and too often the perspectives of those of us who support mercy and redemption are left out of the conversation. I am proud to stand with the CFSY as they work to support survivors, and I hope you will read our perspectives by engaging with this report. Respectfully, Sharletta Evans Executive Director Colorado Crime Survivors Network
As you read, we encourage you to explore the following themes that were captured across several participant responses:
Evolution Many participants described how their perspectives have shifted over time. Their journeys of grief, accountability, and healing were not linear or predetermined, but shaped by experience, reflection, and growth.
Beyond a Single Story Participants expressed a range of views, showing that not all voices are the same on this issue. There are thousands of perspectives on youth violence, extreme sentences, and crime, and all of the interviewees came to support CFSY’s mission to end life-without-parole sentences for children through different avenues.
Fair Chances Participants frequently discussed the concept of forgiveness, the meaning of “closure,” and a desire to ensure that another life is not wasted even in the face of opposition from loved ones.
Many survivors across the country, including several members of our community and many featured in this report, are engaging with transformative, healing, and restorative justice practices. They are envisioning, building, and implementing healing responses to harm, leading the effort to create pathways to justice and redemption. Our Survivors’ Justice Initiative reflects another facet in our evolution of following such leadership, focusing on community, healing, and access to restorative responses, even when the most serious harms occur. We are deeply grateful for the opportunity to partner with such incredible individuals in our fight for justice. We are honored to walk alongside them and thankful that this broader community—including members of our National Family Network (NFN) and Incarcerated Children’s Advocacy Network (ICAN)—has supported meaningful healing and connection for so many. We also extend our sincere appreciation to our partners at Baker McKenzie, without whom this report would not be possible. We hope you read the experiences in this report with respect and care. Onward! Crystal Carpenter Chief Program & Strategy Officer Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youtth
Citations: Alliance for Safety and Justice. (2024). Crime survivors speak 2024: a national survey of victims’ views on safety and justice. https://asj.allianceforsafetyandjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/CrimeSurvivorsSpeak2024.pdf Shaffer, J. N., & Ruback, R. B. (2002). Violent victimization as a risk factor for violent offending among juveniles. US Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/195737.pdf Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (2023). Fact sheet: second chances for children in the criminal legal system. https://cfsy.org/wp-content/uploads/NCVCCFSY-Fact-Sheet-January-2023.pdf Lowery, W., Kelly, K., Mellnik, T., & Steven Rich. (2018). Where killings go unsolved. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/investigations/where-murders-go-unsolved/
National Center for Victims of Crime National Association of Crime Victims Compensation Board Compassionate Friends Tips and resources for processing grief and loss
Resources for survivors of violence and family members who have lost loved ones to violence
Handout for complicated grief 24/7 Grief Hotline 5 Steps to Cope with Disenfranchised Grief – when society may not fully validate your grief
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Abd’Allah says that justice “doesn’t always involve incarceration. More often, harmed people don’t experience a feeling that justice is served simply because a person is “disappeared” from our society in their name. In fact, harmed individuals will attest, harm is hardly ever repaired due the offender being sent away; it is repaired when the person causing the harm is truly remorseful for the harm caused, they cease and desist causing harm, and they are actively working to repair the harm they caused while being resolved to never repeat the harm…It’s the restoration of these rights where you see people healing, learning to love, to hope, to trust again. Those are the moments that remind you of the best of our humanity where all of us have the right to redemption just as we retain the right to heal from harm”
Abd’Allah Lateef was 17 when he and his 21-year old co-defendant participated in what was to be a snatch and run robbery of an elderly man. In the process of the robbery, the gentleman was shoved to the floor and suffered a fracture to his femur, an injury that ultimately resulted in his death. Under Pennsylvania’s felony murder statute, Abd’Allah was charged as an adult and, at only 17 years old, received a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
“Why is it that my skin color dictates how I’m treated as a child, why does my skin color erase my humanity?” Abd’Allah was the first person in his county to receive a life sentence without the possibility of parole. Coupled with the voices of adult figures in his life telling him “if you weren’t black, you wouldn’t get that sentence,” the judge’s words that Abd’Allah would be sentenced to life without parole despite not being “the worst of the worst” were difficult to comprehend. During his re-sentencing over three decades later following reforms at the U.S. Supreme Court, the judge allowed Abd’Allah to speak with the surviving family members of the victim in his case in private. It was this conversation that convinced those family members that they “heard what they needed to hear 30 years ago.”
“When you think of the unnecessary trauma and the additional pain and suffering that each of us suffered as a result of the way the system pretends to seek justice, [it’s] shameful.” Abd’Allah points to models of restorative justice, and alternative ways that we can seek to repair the harm in our communities and our relationships outside of the criminal legal system. As he continues his advocacy and works with individuals who have both committed and been the recipients of harm, he believes the relationships that are built and the healing that can occur both inside and outside of the system are true proof that transformative healing and restorative justice work.
But Abd’Allah’s sentiment hadn’t changed over the last 30 years. Instead, during his first trial, he was merely following his attorney’s instructions on how to act in the courtroom, conduct which the victim’s family interpreted as that of a child who was stoic, showing no signs of remorse. From the very beginning, this created an adversarial situation between Abd’Allah and the victim’s family. But Abd’Allah believes the system is designed this way. In practice, Abd’Allah has seen how those dynamics have exacerbated the grief suffered by those on all sides of harm. There was no avenue for him to genuinely say “I’m sorry.” It wasn’t until 30 years later that he had the opportunity to finally speak to the family and share what he needed to share, which, coincidentally, were the very same things they needed to hear from him initially.
“Being part of a movement that’s about human connection, racial equity and social and economic justice while simultaneously uplifting our shared humanity -- these are the characteristics that help me to reconcile the detriment of my own suffering, and creates a sense of purpose and to a certain extent, healing and atonement.” One of Abd’Allah’s key beliefs is from Bryan Stevenson, a social justice activist and the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative. He mentions the concept of ‘proximity’ when it comes to changing the narrative around children engaging in violent offenses, and particularly, changing the narrative about African American and Latino youth. Abd’Allah believes this is an essential component of the CFSY’s work, that “they get proximate to the children and families affected by violent crime, they get proximate to the legislators dealing with violent crime bills…They change the narrative around who holds value despite causing harm and who is deserving of dignity and the right to redemption.”
The concept of being proximate also applies to his own journey. Meeting with and being proximate to the family members in his case was incredibly important for him, as was dealing with his own trauma from being incarcerated for over thirty years with the expectation of dying in prison, “Being proximate to ICAN, CFSY and the NFN community, and being part of a movement that’s about human connection, racial equity, recognizing our shared humanity — these are the characteristics that help me reconcile the detriment of my own suffering, and creates sense of purpose, and to a certain extent, healing and atonement.”
And that is exactly what they did. Through Darryl’s non-profit, Deep Forgiveness, the two men began working together, speaking across the country about healing and testifying before state legislatures in support of second chances for youth who cause harm. Darryl is also currently pursuing a PhD in Social Work at Morgan State University. Darryl’s own experience of loss gives him a unique standing in difficult conversations. “When I spoke to victims, survivors, and family members… they understood that I understood their pain.” He now uses that shared understanding to advocate against extreme sentences for children.
For Darryl Green, grief first took the shape of rage, a desire for vengeance against the 15-year-old who killed his brother. But in the depths of his anger, he recognized a chilling parallel: the same impulsive, destructive fire fueling his own thoughts of retaliation was what led to his brother’s death in the first place. It was a terrifying realization that led to a profound epiphany—he could either become another link in a chain of violence or he could be the one to break it.
When Darryl Green’s younger brother Ruben was killed by 15-year-old Kimyon Marshall, Darryl’s first instinct wasn't for justice, but for a brutal, Old Testament revenge. He didn't see himself as a victim, but as the coming retribution. “I didn’t care what the consequences were,” Darryl says. “I just wanted him and his family to suffer.” The thoughts became a plan. He came home from college with a pistol and a singular mindset: to make Kimyon’s family “feel the same pain, the same hurt.” His rage spared nobody, and Darryl was consumed with an impulse to harm anyone close to Kimyon—"his mother, his father, his sister, his brother, the dog, the goldfish.”
This intellectual understanding took nearly two decades to become an emotional reality for Darryl. “I was tired of being angry,” Darryl recalls. “I asked my higher power to take this anger off of me, and give me something else… ultimately, he gave me forgiveness.” The culmination of this journey arrived 25 years after his brother’s death, at Kimyon’s resentencing hearing. After Kimyon read a letter expressing his profound remorse, Darryl stood up to speak. He looked at the man who was once the focus of his rage and made an astonishing offer: “You were known for taking a life,” he said, “so let’s you and I save some lives together.”
Ultimately, he is grateful he did not act. Instead of picking up the gun, Darryl picked up a textbook. He returned to his studies, earning degrees in criminal justice and social work, driven by a need to understand the human behavior that had shattered his family. In seeking to understand the system, he unexpectedly found a path to his own reconciliation. His studies forced him to see Kimyon not just as an aggressor, but as a child. “His brain wasn’t even developed yet,” Darryl says. “I began to think about what kind of trauma…did this young man go through that would have him do something so heinous?” He thought about the impulsive nature of youth. “It was three seconds of anger, three seconds of rage… he made a decision that he couldn’t take back.”
“I’m against locking up our babies and throwing away the key.” For Darryl, it comes down to a simple, powerful truth. “Everybody deserves a second chance. None of us are perfect,” he says. “We can’t throw our babies away. We can’t throw our babies away.”
That letter marked the beginning of a relationship that has been, for Jeanne, profoundly healing. She shared her memories of Nancy and Richard with David in what she calls her “own kind of one-on-one victim impact statement,” ensuring that he understood the enormity of the lives he took. As they remained in communication, Jeanne watched her perception of him transform. The “killer” she once feared was now a “gentle human being who seemed to want nothing more than to let me know how sorry he was.”
For two decades, Jeanne Bishop was certain of two things: Her pregnant sister Nancy and brother-in-law Richard were gone forever, and David Biro, the teenager who killed them, deserved to die in prison for it. Then, a friend asked her a simple question she couldn't answer, and the picture she’d held for more than 20 years began to dissolve.
Jeanne’s story began in April 1990, after a family dinner celebrating her sister Nancy’s pregnancy. Later that night, in the basement of their own home, Nancy and her husband Richard were murdered at gunpoint by David Biro, then just a teenager. The news was a seismic shock, yet Jeanne’s first instinct was one of radical grace. “When police told us Nancy and Richard had been killed,” she recalls, “the first thing that came out of my mouth was ‘I don’t want to hate anyone.’” After David was convicted and sentenced to life without parole, she thought, “I forgive you, and now I’m never going to think about you.” She didn’t wish him ill, but she accepted his fate.
Jeanne realized she didn’t know. She had to find out for herself who David had become. She wrote him a letter. In it, she expressed the forgiveness she’d held at a distance for so long and apologized for not offering it sooner. She told him she’d been waiting decades for his apology but decided she would go first. And she offered to visit him. A few weeks later, a 14-page, double-sided letter arrived. For the first time, David confessed to the crime in writing. He apologized to her and her family. And at the end, he asked her to come see him.
“My sister and brother-in-law died on a cold concrete floor,” she reasoned, “and that’s where he was going to die too.” That remained her attitude for 20 years. But as she became an advocate against gun violence and the death penalty, she found herself surrounded by allies who also opposed sentencing children to die in prison. It forced her to re-examine her own story. Was locking a boy away forever truly the only way to honor her sister? The turning point came after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that mandatory juvenile life-without-parole sentences were unconstitutional, granting David a resentencing hearing. Jeanne no longer firmly believed in life sentences for children, but the thought of his release still felt wrong. She assumed, after all those years, that he was still remorseless. It was then that a friend challenged her with a disarmingly simple question: “How do you know that?”
This journey reshaped her understanding of justice. To those who say extreme sentences provide closure, Jeanne’s response is simple: “Closure is a myth.” The vengeance of having someone locked away, she discovered, “is no substitute for the healing that we seek.” She now honors Nancy and Richard by trying to do the good in the world they no longer can. Her experience has taught her a deep humility about the limits of human judgment.
“I don’t think we’re God,” she says. “I don’t think we can know 10 years, 20 years, 30 years into the future, who this precious human being will be.” Her story has left her with a clear conviction, a guiding principle for us all: “Reconciliation,” she advises, “is profoundly more healing than revenge.”
Her studies led her to the concept of restorative justice, a philosophy focused not on punishment, but on repairing harm. She learned that the human brain does not fully mature until age 25, a scientific fact that complicated the idea of condemning a 15-year-old for an impulsive, drug-fueled act, however horrific. Her personal quest for answers evolved into a professional calling, and she would go on to teach psychology, serve on state-level criminal justice councils, and become an expert in victim-offender mediation. Her belief in this work would face its ultimate test. In 2000, nearly 14 years after her daughter’s murder, she put her scholarship into practice. She agreed to meet one of her daughter’s killers, Gary Brown, in a mediated dialogue.
Note: Dr. Linda White tragically passed away in 2025. Linda’s legacy of compassion and advocacy will live on in our hearts and through the many lives she personally impacted, and her personal connections with so many in the CFSY community will be cherished forever. We encourage readers to reflect on Linda’s life and her work, and to read this material with care.
“Grief is a mountain,” Linda often says. “You can’t go around it.” Linda’s grief over the finality of her daughter’s death felt insurmountable. When the two boys responsible were sentenced to die in prison, Linda began to feel that the sentence added was making the mountain feel insurmountable. Eventually, she invited one of the boys to help her climb it. Linda White’s nightmare began with a child’s voice on the phone on a November morning in 1986. It was her five-year-old granddaughter, Ami, home alone and wondering why her mother, Cathy, hadn’t taken her to preschool. Linda picked up Ami for school but her initial flicker of annoyance at her daughter’s irresponsibility soon turned to fear. A few days later, the Sheriff confirmed Linda and her husband’s greatest horror: their daughter, Cathy, pregnant with her second child, had been murdered.
But as months turned to years, a sense of unease grew. “Nobody’s story ever changed,” she says. “Everything we sought to do was bringing others down low with us, not anything about bringing people up, including us.” Linda and her husband were trying to heal, but the support group’s stories unflinchingly focused on how to make the criminal justice system “meaner and leaner.” There was talk of punishment, she remembers, but “nothing being done towards healing.” The breaking point came during a car ride home from one of these meetings. Exhausted, her husband turned to her and asked: “Where do they get the energy for all that anger?” That simple question changed everything. It crystallized what Linda had been feeling: that a life fueled by anger was unsustainable. She needed a new framework, a new language for her grief. That search led her toward the halls of academia. She enrolled in a doctoral program at Texas A&M University, determined to understand the roots of violence and the nature of justice.
The details were staggering. Two 15-year-old boys, Gary Brown and Marion “Marvin” Berry, had escaped a drug rehabilitation facility. High and desperate, they forced Cathy down the street, sexually assaulted her, and shot her. They hid the gun and fled. When they were caught, they confessed and were each sentenced to more than 50 years – a lifetime. In the aftermath the tragedy “ripple[d] out like pebbles in the water,” touching everyone. “All of us were victims,” Linda recalls. She sought solace in a support group for survivors of violent crime, a space where her raw anger was understood, for which she was grateful.
When she sat across from him, she saw the devastation he still carried. “There’s a soft center to him,” she says, speaking of his humanity. “In many ways, even though he was one of the perpetrators, Gary is also one of the biggest victims.” That meeting forged an unlikely connection. Linda began to advocate for Gary, and in 2009, he was released on parole. She proudly says he has since become a productive member of his community, living proof that change is possible.
“For those who were sentenced young and grew up in prison like Gary,” Linda argues, “we need to give them a chance.”
Sure enough, Lynette says, “I have found out over the years that I am not alone.” Across the country, there are countless survivors who want to help the people who have harmed them, and not all survivors want the harshest punishment possible, even though such perspectives are regularly amplified both in court and in the media.
For years after the attack, one question haunted Lynette Grace. It wasn’t about the violence or the pain, but something more intimate that terrified her. She had survived a stabbing by her friend’s 16-year-old son, Johnny Bell, moments after he killed his own mother. Now, she had to know: “How could he take his own mother’s life?”
The violence erupted on a Sunday morning. Lynette was staying with her friend Eddie after her own mother's funeral when she awoke to the sounds of Eddie arguing with her teenage son Johnny. The fight escalated, and Johnny stabbed his mother. When Lynette discovered Eddie bleeding on the floor, Johnny turned on her. At his sentencing, Lynette remembers seeing not a monster, but a kid. She trusted the court to be "fair" when he was given a lengthy sentence, and for a long time, she thought the verdict brought her closure. But it didn’t. The unanswered questions festered. “If I saw him in church,” she wondered, “would I have to run from him? Would he run from me?” She decided she had to find out for herself. Guided by her faith, she finally sought a conversation with Johnny while he was in prison.
“Initially, I viewed myself as a victim. I view myself now as a survivor.” While she encourages others like her who have been harmed to pursue opportunities for forgiveness and healing, she recognizes that it took her some time to prepare for her conversation with Johnny. Lynette’s faith was a particular source of energy for her when others didn’t understand her actions. “You might have to walk the forgiveness path alone,” she warns, acknowledging that family members and others turned against her and Johnny for their reconciliation. “We were punished for our forgiveness,” she says, but she and Johnny felt sure that sharing their story could help others in similar situations. “It’s the ‘not knowing,’” Lynette believes, “that may be the reason for ‘lock them up and throw away the key.’ But if you had the chance to sit face-to-face and ask why…that might help you heal.”
The meeting changed everything. He asked for her forgiveness, and she learned that he carried a deep and abiding remorse. His actions had haunted him for years. He couldn’t bring his mother back, but he was trying, in every way he knew how, to repair the harm he had caused. In that conversation, Lynette says, she “finally had peace of mind” and was able to forgive him. But the most profound healing came from a different kind of confession. She told Johnny about the guilt she carried for having survived. His response was simple and immediate: “Don’t feel that way.” In that moment, his vulnerability and compassion opened the door for Lynette to forgive herself and undergo an empowering transformation.
She has seen Johnny’s efforts to better himself, and it has solidified her belief that people like him deserve a second chance. Children must be held accountable for harm they cause, she says, but they must also be recognized for their capacity for change. Seeing that Johnny is trying to live a better life and is remorseful was more helpful to her than the harsh sentence he received. It’s a perspective she believes is shared by many survivors whose voices are often unheard. Wanting to help others in her situation who are made to think they are alone in seeking healing through forgiveness, Lynette travels and shares her story through her organization and a 2023 play she wrote about her experience titled, “A Crime of Forgiveness,” which examined restorative justice, healing, and reconciliation. Lynette is proud to share that it was well-received, selling out its opening in Ohio.
For years, Lynette D. Grace lived in the suffocating space of “not knowing.” Finding the answers to her questions didn’t just bring her peace; it gave her a purpose. It proved that conversation can be more powerful than condemnation, and that understanding can heal what a prison sentence cannot. Now, she dedicates her life to helping others find their own answers, creating a space where the question "why?" isn't a source of fear, but the first step toward a complicated, courageous, and shared peace.
“With or without parole, a child receiving a life sentence is unacceptable.” As someone facing the grief of losing a family member while contending with her child being sent to prison for decades, Nikki’s dual perspective gave her a unique voice. When people ask her if she would feel differently had another child been the cause of her grandmother’s death, her answer is an unwavering no. “I think these extreme sentences prohibit closure,” she attests.
Nikki Olson’s grandmother helped her get through school and raise her son. When Nikki learned that her grandmother had died, she was thrust into grief. When she learned that her own 13-year-old son, Antonio, was partially responsible, she was thrust into an impossible reality. Suddenly, she was what some in the system call “dual impacted”: a family member to both the victim and a person who caused harm.
After Nikki’s grandmother was killed by two thirteen year old boys, she was forced to simultaneously navigate her profound sense of loss and a justice system that thoroughly jaded her. She entered the sentencing process with a mother’s hope. She believed her son Antonio’s history of a brain injury would be seen as a crucial mitigating factor for his involvement in her grandmother’s death. That hope was quickly dismantled as she watched her son be characterized not as a child with a compromised brain, but as a cunning manipulator. The media portrayed him as deceptively kind, and the prosecutor famously warned the public, “don’t let his Justin Bieber haircut fool you.” As she looked to the justice system to help her process the death of her grandmother and protect the rights of her child, all her preconceived notions about the system were quickly tested.
“His age was acknowledged,” Nikki remembers, “but what that meant in context was not discussed during sentencing…Thirteen-year-olds are younger, more impulsive, have less control over their lives, and are less likely to think about long-term consequences. That was not spoken about.” The sentence was so abstract, so beyond the comprehension of a child, that its weight didn’t immediately land for him. As Nikki puts it, “He didn’t know that he had a life sentence until years later. It just went in one ear and out the other.” Faced with a system that seemed to lack nuance or understanding, Nikki pursued her own education. She dove into research on adolescent brain development and the fundamental differences in children and adults, arming herself with the knowledge that she thought had been overlooked in court. She knew her son had caused great harm and needed to be held accountable, but she also knew a child should never be told that they are beyond redemption.
Her disillusionment deepened. She wanted to proceed to trial, but Antonio’s lawyer recommended a plea, warning that a judge would view a trial as a "waste of his time" and deliver a harsher sentence. When Nikki pushed back, she was rebuffed. “You are not my client,” the lawyer told her flatly. “The 13-year-old is my client.” Feeling overwhelmed and confused, Antonio pleaded no contest. At sentencing, the judge used her son’s brain injury not as a reason for compassion, but as a justification for fear, suggesting it made Antonio more of a threat to society and thus more deserving of a harsher, adult sentence. At 14 years old, he was sentenced to life in prison, with his first chance at parole not coming until he was 50.
For Nikki, true closure will only come when children like her son are no longer condemned to a future without hope. This conviction fuels her work today as the leader of the Wisconsin Alliance for Youth Justice (WAYJ), where she provides peer support to families with children tangled in the justice system and advocates for legislative change.
It is slow, tedious work, but Nikki remains committed. She uses her dual role as the grieving granddaughter of a victim and the loving mother of a child serving a life sentence to change hearts and minds, one conversation at a time. Working for change, she says, is the only way to move forward.
“If you didn’t know their backgrounds, you would just think it was a bunch of people enjoying their time and being friendly,” he recalls. “It was an experience in seeing how someone could change—I didn’t know them 20 years ago, but I know them now…and I can tell that they are good people.” This human connection gave important context to the science he began to learn—that teenage brains are not the same as adult brains, and that recidivism rates for people sent to prison as children who were sentenced to life without parole (LWOP) but later released are remarkably low. His thinking evolved. “There was no way juvenile offenders should be sentenced to life in prison without any possibility of release,” he realized.
On the evening of September 5, 2002, Paul LaRuffa left the Clinton, MD Italian restaurant he and his wife had owned and operated for over 16 years to go home after a long day’s work. He put his laptop and bank bag in the back seat and then opened the front door and sat in the driver’s seat. Before he could start the car for his short trip home, his driver’s side window exploded with a loud bang and glass shattered all over him. That was the first shot. Four more followed rapidly. All five shots struck Paul. He slumped over toward the center console, dazed, confused and bleeding profusely. The two people who left the restaurant with Paul called 911. Thankfully, help arrived soon and Paul was transported to a trauma center where doctors operated for several hours and saved his life.
This was only the beginning of Paul’s ordeal, and what would be many weeks of nightly flashbacks. “I knew, at some point every night, I would jump out of sleep hearing the shots and feeling the shattered glass hitting me,” Paul recalls. “I couldn’t make these flashbacks go away. That was the toughest thing” Weeks later, the “D.C. Sniper” attacks began terrorizing the entire Washington, DC area. Like all DMV residents, Paul was afraid to do everyday tasks like getting groceries and pumping gas. However, Paul was unaware of the connection between the attempt on his life and the D.C. sniper shootings until October 23, 2002, when police found his stolen laptop in the blue Chevrolet Caprice used by John Allen Muhammad and then 17-year-old Lee Boyd Malvo. Paul was their first D.C.-area victim.
During the creation of one documentary, Paul was asked if he would be willing to speak with someone from an organization called the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth (CFSY). He was told they were involved with people who committed crimes as juveniles, were sentenced to long or even life-without-parole sentences, and were released after serving a number of years in prison. Paul agreed to meet with them. He spent days with over a dozen formerly incarcerated people, sharing meals and engaging in conversations. He gave them tips on running a successful business; they shared stories of their backgrounds and upbringings. He saw people who had invested in rehabilitation, and understood the gravity and harm of their past actions. It was clear to Paul that these people were not who they were when they were teenagers.
The capture of the “D.C. Snipers” was important to Paul because it answered the question of who shot him which helped alleviate the fear associated with not knowing. Eventually, the flashbacks subsided. Paul testified in both trials, with John Muhammad’s trial about a year after he was shot and Lee Boyd Malvo’s shortly after that. As a result of the panic it caused over the D.C. area and beyond, The attacks were publicized worldwide. In the aftermath, there were many articles, documentaries, books, and news segments that documented the attacks, and Paul was asked to participate and contribute to many over the years.
Now, he is a firm advocate for reform. “I am all for laws that say a juvenile should not be sentenced to LWOP. They should have a chance,” he insists. “A chance is not a guarantee.” Paul believes that face-to-face interaction is the key to changing minds, even for those like him who have been deeply harmed. Paul knows people who are “smart and kind, but who still hold on to anger from what happened to them.” Having experienced that anger and then finally some understanding, he says, “if they would meet some of the people I have met and known for more than 9 years, there is a good chance that they would change their minds.”
Paul takes pride in being a survivor, acknowledging that he “was a victim for a day and a survivor ever since.” He also thinks that there is no single moment that provides closure. “There are many moments on the road to recovery, and never really that one ending. It’s never really over.” Paul is not haunted by his traumatic experience, and thus by harnessing his own past, Paul has found a way to work toward a different future for others.
“We need to shrink those prisons and put the money back into the communities,” she says. “Bring real trauma-recovering spaces for children to reach out and tell someone, ‘Someone is hurting me,’ free of retaliation."
When Rukiye Z. Abdul-Mutakallim first sat in juvenile court for the trial of the people who took her son’s life, she expected to see cold-hearted killers. Instead, what she saw shocked her to her core. “I saw babies,” she recalls. “I was shocked when I saw their faces. These are babies.”
Rukiye’s work is fueled by an unshakeable belief in redemption and a hope that her story can change the hearts of lawmakers who pass laws that allow these extreme sentences. She knows that condemning children does not create safer communities and is adamant that a better future exists through redemption and hope. “If I didn't have hope,” she says firmly, “I would not be sitting here.”
The shock of learning who was responsible for her son’s death came in the wake of an unbearable loss for Rukiye. On June 28, 2015, her son Suliman, a Navy veteran, had just withdrawn $60 from an ATM in Cincinnati, when he was shot in the head from behind. Grainy surveillance footage showed the assailants walking away with her son's cell phone, leaving him to die. Her first impression was of cold-hearted killers who lacked the empathy to even call 911. Her son tragically passed away the very next day, on June 29, 2015. But in the sterile light of the courtroom, that impression was taken over by another reason for despair. She saw a 14-year-old and a 16-year-old, not hardened men. As the system prepared to remand these children to adult court, she saw every authority figure ignore the question she found impossible to push aside: What happened to these children before they harmed her son?
"They are locking them up and burying our children alive in this tomb we call jail, but without understanding what happened to them." In a moment of impossible grace, Rukiye approached the 14-year-old boy in court. She didn’t see the person who took her son’s life; she saw a child who was crying with no one to listen. She hugged him. As she held him, she felt she was hugging her own son, and she made a promise not to leave his side, to help him because he clearly had not received the love he needed. That embrace was a physical manifestation of her future life’s work. Knowing that children learn violent behavior, Rukiye firmly believes children cannot be blamed as if they are fully formed adults. While accountability is necessary, they need protection, education, and love—not a life sentence that is, in her words, a form of "brutal harm" that buries them alive.
"They don't come out with weapons in their hands, lying, stealing, cheating…they don't come out that way." Her frustration with a system that punishes symptoms without treating the cause led her to create her own solution: The Musketeer Association. Drawing on her experiences growing up in the Civil Rights Era, Rukiye designed an organization aimed at ending the cycle of trauma that leads to violence and vengeance. After seeing too many children imprisoned, she works to rehabilitate traumatized and imprisoned children and their suffering communities.
That meeting lit a fire in her. She began lobbying to end life-without-parole sentences for children, arguing it was cruel and unusual punishment. She saw that if young people like Raymond were afforded other opportunities in life, they wouldn't end up in situations where they harmed others. "It could have been our very own children that took the life of another child." Her advocacy became intensely personal. For ten years, she fought for Raymond’s release, coming to see him as family. On November 29, 2021, her efforts and his own profound rehabilitation paid off. Raymond was released from prison.
Raymond is like a son to Sharletta. He takes out her trash, joins her for dinner, and calls to check in. She speaks of him with a fierce, maternal pride. “He has exceeded my expectations,” she says of him. This seemingly ordinary bond is rendered extraordinary by one fact: this is the man who, as a teenager, shot and killed her 3-year-old-son, Casson.
He is an integral part of her life today, and their bond is a living symbol of their capacities for transformation. Sharletta is, in her own words, a "thriver," someone who has taken the worst thing that can happen to a mother and has “exercised every piece of her heart to heal.” Her story is a challenge to a system that discards children for the rest of their lives. Sharletta stresses that so many children who commit horrific crimes experienced horrific treatment beforehand, and that there is a cause to every effect. “It could have been our very own children,” she insists, “that took the life of another child. We all deserve grace, and the opportunity for a second chance.”
Sharletta stresses that family members who have lost loved ones can all benefit from joining in community, and encourages people to reach out. “We don’t start out as survivors,” Sharletta says. “We need to be there for each other, to come together and enhance our healing. So many families are isolated from support and feel like there isn’t anything left for them. I’m here to tell you – you are not alone, and healing is possible.”
Their story began on an unimaginable note, one rooted in tragedy. Four days before Christmas in 1995, Sharletta was on a rescue mission to pick up her young niece. A drive-by shooting had rattled her community near Denver, and Sharletta wanted to bring her niece to safety. She left Casson, his older brother, and her 22-year-old cousin in her car for what she thought would be a moment. As she dashed inside the house, gunfire erupted. Three teenagers opened fire, spraying 21 bullets. One tore through the side window and found her little boy Casson. Tragically, he did not survive. Three days later, three teenagers were arrested, just 15 and 16 years old. When two were sentenced to life without parole despite being children, Sharletta felt a grim sense of resolution. The system “did its job,” she thought. Justice, as she understood it then, had been served.
But the finality of the verdict did not bring peace. In the quiet years that followed, the image of the two boys who received life without parole gnawed at her as she started to compare them to her surviving son, who was not much older. Questions began to surface. What kind of nurturing had they received? Who had taught them their values? Her grief and curiosity converged, leading her to research adolescent brain development and the deep roots of youth violence. She learned the boys who killed her son had grown up without consistent support, adrift in a way her own children were not. “I started seeing the destruction I was currently experiencing as similar to the destruction those young boys experienced growing up,” she recalls. “I had to ask, what led this [child] to this act that is so violent?”
She pictured her son's perpetrators locked in tiny cages, imagined the awful conditions they were enduring, and wondered about their states of mind. The thought of their hopelessness became unbearable. In 2012, seventeen years after her son’s death, she made a stunning choice. She entered into a restorative justice dialogue with Raymond Johnson, the primary shooter. When she finally met him, she saw not the perpetrator of her worst nightmare, but a man who had been a boy with no one in his corner. She saw his remorse, his humanity, and his authenticity. She saw the thin line that separated his fate from her own child’s, a line drawn by trauma, neglect, and abuse.
"Closure was when they let him go." She has since learned she is not alone. Valencia has talked to multiple survivors who, like her, do not believe the harshest sentences bring healing. They believe in accountability, but also in the unique capacity for change that exists in young people.
The tears streaming down Valencia Warren-Gibbs’s face in the courthouse hallway held two distinct sorrows. One was for the brother she would never see again. The other was for the 15-year-old boy who had just been sentenced to die in prison for taking her brother’s life, a boy she saw not as a monster, but as a child whose life was also being extinguished. It was a complex grief that she felt she had to mourn alone, a silent dissent against a verdict everyone else called justice.
Today, Valencia shares her story to help break the silence she once felt so acutely. She speaks at conventions and talks with legislators, advocating for children in the justice system—especially in her home state of Michigan, home to the largest number of people serving life without parole since childhood. Valencia shares her experience so that another grieving family member, standing in a courthouse hallway, won't have to feel ashamed of their own compassion. She does it to inspire the change she wants to see, changing one mind at a time.
When the judge sentenced 15-year-old Bobby Hines to 99 years in prison without parole, Valencia Warren-Gibbs watched from the gallery with dismay. Bobby, labeled the "mastermind" behind the murder of Valencia’s brother by prosecutors, looked like a "little kid” who was overwhelmed. As she heard the sentence, something inside her broke. “I felt like they were killing him too,” she recalls.
In the courthouse hallway moments later, the prosecutor tried to console her. "We got him, he got what he deserved," he said, seeing her tears. But Valencia was too ashamed to admit he had it all wrong. She wasn't crying out of relief. She was crying because she felt this wasn't justice. This wasn't fair. This wasn't going to bring her brother back. That feeling of isolation intensified in the weeks and months that followed. She felt unable to talk to her own family about her grief for Bobby. “If I can't tell my mom how I feel," she reasoned, "then I'm a victim of the system.” In a profound and painful way, Valencia felt re-victimized, this time by a justice system she believed was destroying another child’s life.
"I viewed myself as a victim of the judicial system because of what they did to Bobby." This perspective grew into a firm conviction. "If you can put yourself on the other side of the lens, it can happen to any of us," she says. "Do you know how many mistakes I made at 13, 14, 15? And to think I'm still held accountable 40 years later? I don't think that's fair." She believes children deserve second chances and that life-without-parole sentences for kids should be abolished. For years, Bobby’s sentence was an open wound for Valencia. She wanted him to know that not everyone was against him, that someone believed he deserved a chance at freedom. Then, in September 2017, she heard he was going to be released. The relief was immediate and total.
When Xavier was released from prison at age 26, he spent his first few days in a homeless shelter. But after moving in with his family, securing a job as a barista, and pursuing more education and training, Xavier began working in violence intervention and prevention in some of Chicago’s toughest neighborhoods, and then, soon after, as clinical research interviewer at Northwestern University where he learned more about the outcomes of other currently and formerly incarcerated youth. He then transitioned to the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth, where he continued to advocate for youth justice. He traveled the country to testify on his experiences and to meet with legislators and bring about meaningful change in the realm of youth sentencing. He recalls connecting with both survivors and previously incarcerated people.
At the age of 13, Xavier McElrath-Bey was a child welfare runaway and gang member, often finding himself sleeping in the streets. On the night of October 28, 1989, while serving as a “security” lookout for his gang, he alerted his friends of a suspected rival gang member, Pedro, and approached him. Within minutes, Pedro was lured into an abandoned building where he was beaten to death.
Through his continued work with the CFSY, Xavier’s story gained more visibility and he continued to share his experience and remorse for what happened to Pedro. He talked about the unfortunate circumstances that led to Pedro’s loss, and his sadness and deep regret. Eventually, his story would garner the attention of Pedro’s family. They reached out and offered to meet with Xavier and talk about what happened the night Pedro passed away. Xavier agreed to meet with Pedro’s family, and when the day finally arrived, “I realized something in that moment that I had not realized before, that the [meeting] wasn’t just about me, it wasn’t just about Pedro, that in fact for many in that room, it was about a family that had been through so much. A family that has struggled so much and really needed healing in their lives all together. And I embraced that,
and I also understood I had a role to play there, and my role was to answer their questions as best as I could, and hopefully give them hope and remind them the world is not as evil as they think.” Xavier told Pedro’s family about how his guilt and remorse for the loss of Pedro had caused him to change his life. Xavier knew he had a responsibility to do something better. He wanted to live out his eternal apology by doing something positive for his community in memory of Pedro. Today, Xavier continues his advocacy as Executive Director of the CFSY. He knows the importance of not giving up on any child and ensuring that none fall through the cracks in the systems. He invites us to reflect on his story and others like his, and to ask ourselves what we could have done differently and how we can ensure that the next generation of children does not repeat our mistakes.
“The moment we knew he was actually dead, the whole atmosphere changed. Some of us who were outside the building looked at each other, and it was an unspoken yet shared sense of regret and remorse, instant remorse.” Xavier was prosecuted in adult criminal court because the juvenile judge stated he was “incorrigible.” “I was a visibly small child, I was 13 years old, probably weighed about 110 pounds, but my rap sheet, my criminal arrest record didn’t say that, they just saw me as a monster, they didn’t see me as a child.” In Xavier’s mind at only 13, he too believed that perhaps this judge was correct, that he was indeed beyond repair.
Through the efforts of Xavier’s public defender, he received a 25-year sentence plea deal, instead of a 40-year sentence. The 25-year sentence had a day-for-day provision, which meant for every good day that he served, one day would be taken off his sentence. For Xavier, this meant “at least [having a] light at the end of the tunnel.” At age 18, after being transferred to Pontiac Correctional Center, he realized that he was at the “age where people are graduating from high school” and he had “just graduated to the worst prison in the state.” During Xavier’s time in prison, he started to gain perspective, and he began to think often about Pedro and the harm that he had caused.
Growing up in prison, Xavier began to understand the world he and Pedro grew up in. “I didn’t know much about the challenges that he faced in his life. I just knew that if you grew up in my neighborhood, in Back of the Yards, you’re living in poverty. You’re surrounded with violence. There are gangs everywhere. There’s violence at every turn.” Xavier reflected how he could have easily been in Pedro’s place, dead at the age of only 11 when he was shot in his face, accidentally, at point blank range. However Xavier also understood that he, unlike Pedro, had the opportunity to turn his life around, an opportunity Pedro would never have. Xavier recalls reflecting on how he could ensure that Pedro’s life was not lost in vain, and determining that the best thing he could do was to bring healing into his life and the lives of others, to choose to “live a better life.”
