MACDL President Victoria Kelleher testified on October 8, 2019 on behalf of MACDL before the Legislative Committee in support of H3358/S826, An Act to Reduce Mass Incarceration, which would permit a parole hearing for prisoners serving life in prison after 25 years. Her testimony focused on (1) the negligible difference between first degree murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of parole, and second degree murder, which allows parole eligibility after 15 years, particularly where a jury can convict a defendant of first-degree murder if it finds only seconds of premeditation; (2) the fact that the SJC has noted, most recently in Com. v. Quinton Williams, the ample empirical evidence of disparate treatment of African Americans, who are (a) more often charged with mandatory minimums and (b) more likely to be charged with the most serious charges when the victim is white than similarly situated white defendants; and (3) the case of William Allen, who was charged at 20 years old as a joint venturer and was convicted after exercising his constitutional right to a jury trial, while his co-defendant (who actually committed the murder) pled to second and is today a free man.
