Geer v. SCDPPS

THIS OPINION HAS NO PRECEDENTIAL VALUE. IT SHOULD NOT BE
CITED OR RELIED ON AS PRECEDENT IN ANY PROCEEDING
EXCEPT AS PROVIDED BY RULE 268(d)(2), SCACR.

THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA
In The Court of Appeals

Nicholas M. Geer, Respondent,

v.

South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and
Parden Services, Appellant.

Appellate Case No. 2015-002522

Appeal From The Administrative Law Court
Ralph King Anderson, III, Chief Administrative Law
Judge

Unpublished Opinion No. 2018-UP-216
Submitted February 1, 2018 – Filed May 23, 2018

AFFIRMED

Tommy Evans, Jr., of South Carolina Department of
Probation, Parole, and Pardon Services, of Columbia, for
Appellant.

Emily C. Paavola, Zoe Alexandra Jones, and Lindsey
Sterling Vann, all of Justice 360, of Columbia, for
Respondent.
PER CURIAM: The South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon
Services (Department) appeals the administrative law court's (ALC) order
reversing the Department's denial of parole to Nicholas M. Geer (Geer). We
affirm.

In Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012), the Supreme Court held that "the
Eighth Amendment forbids a sentencing scheme that mandates life in prison
without possibility of parole for juvenile offenders." Miller at 479; see
Montgomery v. Louisiana, 136 S.Ct. 718, 736 (2016) ("The Court now holds that
Miller announced a substantive rule of constitutional law."). The Supreme Court
expounded on the relevance of an offender's age and maturity level to sentencing
decisions, noting that "a sentencer misses too much if he treats every child as an
adult." Miller at 477. The Supreme Court further concluded that

[b]y requiring that all children convicted of homicide
receive lifetime incarceration without possibility of
parole, regardless of their age and age-related
characteristics and the nature of their crimes, the
mandatory-sentencing schemes before us violate this
principle of proportionality, and so the Eighth
Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Miller at 489.

In Aiken v. Byars, 410 S.C. 534, 765 S.E.2d 572 (2014), the Court applied Miller
retroactively and extended it to juvenile offenders sentenced in South Carolina to
life without parole under a nonmandatory statutory scheme. See Montgomery, 136
S.Ct. at 736 ("Miller announced a substantive rule that is retroactive in cases on
collateral review"). The Aiken court held that Miller established "an affirmative
requirement that courts fully explore the impact of the defendant's juvenility on the
sentence rendered." Aiken, 410 S.C. at 543, 765 S.E.2d at 577. Therefore, in
South Carolina, "before a life without parole sentence is imposed upon a juvenile
offender, he must receive an individualized hearing where the mitigating hallmark
features of youth are fully explored." Id. at 545, 765 S.E.2d at 578. Under the
Aiken court's interpretation of Miller, a sentencing court is to consider the
following factors in the individualized hearing:

(1) the chronological age of the offender and the
hallmark features of youth, including immaturity,
impetuosity, and failure to appreciate risk and
consequence; (2) the family and home environment that
surrounded the offender; (3) the circumstances of the
homicide offense, including the extent of the offender's
participation in the conduct and how familial and peer
pressures may have affected him; (4) the incompetencies
associated with youth— for example, the offender's
inability to deal with police officers or prosecutors
(including on a plea agreement) or the offender's
incapacity to assist his own attorneys; and (5) the
possibility of rehabilitation.

Id. at 544, 765 S.E.2d at 577 (internal quotation marks omitted); see Montgomery,
136 S.Ct. at 736 ("A State may remedy a Miller violation by permitting juvenile
homicide offenders to be considered for parole, rather than by resentencing
them.").

In the case before us, we find no evidence showing that Geer's youth was taken
into account before he was deprived of the possibility of parole. Based on the
foregoing, the order of the ALC is

AFFIRMED.1

HUFF, GEATHERS, and MCDONALD, JJ., concur.

1
We decide this case without oral argument pursuant to Rule 215, SCACR.