On November 18, 2001, 18-year-old Lawrence Stephens walked onto the scene of the Virginia robbery. His 29-year-old white co-worker had made the plans. Stephens had a baby on the way, two jobs, but nowhere to live – so he agreed.
But his punishment was far beyond what anyone could imagine.
No one was injured. Only a few hundred dollars were stolen. But a now-dead judge, Prentis Smiley, sentenced Stephens to 1,823 years in prison – more than 23 life sentences! His white co-worker got 10 years.
“I was just a teenage kid, and I made a poor decision in my life,” said Stephens. “I always wondered, if I don’t get out of here, what will I do? Some nights [I had] thoughts of suicide.” Fortunately though, there was a light at the end of his tunnel.
After receiving a conditional pardon from Governor Ralph Northam in December 2021, Stephens will be free to come home to his family in early 2022. “Christmas came early this year,” he celebrated. But the criminal legal system is still anything but just.
Instead of doling out inhumane, ridiculous punishments for being poor and unhoused, Stephens should have been assessed as someone who really just needed and deserved the resources to survive. Instead, they fought to rob him of entire life – and more! So what's the real point of this system?