Connecticut Begins To Confront Racial Disparities In Mandatory Minimum Sentencing

Joette Katz Authors CT Law Tribune Article, "Connecticut Begins to Confront Racial Disparities in Mandatory Minimum Sentencing"

Last week, in State v. Belcher, an opinion authored by Justice Mullins, a unanimous Connecticut Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the trial court denying the defendant's motion to correct an illegal sentence. The court held that the sentencing court had abused its discretion when it substantially relied on materially false information in imposing a 60-year sentence; specifically, that the defendant, a Black teenager, was a ''charter member'' of a mythical group of teenage ''superpredators.'' As the state's Supreme Court noted, "[i]t was the prism through which the court viewed this defendant" in concluding that the sentence had been imposed in an illegal manner.