Pa. high court revisits juvenile life sentences

Daily Legal News

Pennsylvania's highest court is weighing how to resentence prisoners who were given automatic life sentences as juveniles.

A recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling outlaws mandatory life-without-parole sentences for juveniles.

There are nearly 500 juvenile lifers in Pennsylvania, half from Philadelphia.

The state Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Wednesday morning in a pair of representative cases.

The defendants are Ian Cunningham, serving life for a second-degree murder conviction in Philadelphia, and Qu'Eed Batts, convicted of first-degree murder in Northampton County.

Cunningham's case concerns lifers who have exhausted direct appeals but want to invoke the Supreme Court decision in new filings.

In the Batts case, lawyers will debate what term is appropriate for those sentenced to life without parole.

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Grounds for Divorce in Ohio - Sylkatis Law, LLC

A divorce in Ohio is filed when there is typically “fault” by one of the parties and party not at “fault” seeks to end the marriage. A court in Ohio may grant a divorce for the following reasons:
• Willful absence of the adverse party for one year
• Adultery
• Extreme cruelty
• Fraudulent contract
• Any gross neglect of duty
• Habitual drunkenness
• Imprisonment in a correctional institution at the time of filing the complaint
• Procurement of a divorce outside this state by the other party

Additionally, there are two “no-fault” basis for which a court may grant a divorce:
• When the parties have, without interruption for one year, lived separate and apart without cohabitation
• Incompatibility, unless denied by either party

However, whether or not the the court grants the divorce for “fault” or not, in Ohio the party not at “fault” will not get a bigger slice of the marital property.