Providing a chance at parole for rehabilitated juvenile “lifers” is especially important during the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, a 17-year-old survivor of domestic violence is preparing for trial in Texas. She faces up to 40 years in prison for a murder committed by a man her family says was trafficking her. Despite Zephaniah Trevino’s history of trauma and agreement by the defense and the prosecution that she did not pull the trigger, she is on the precipice of an extreme prison sentence. How did we get here?
Read the rest of this op-ed from the Austin-American Statesman.