Key events in juvenile execution history
First documented execution for a juvenile crime in the United States. Thomas Graunger, 16, was hanged in Plymouth Colony for having sexual intercourse with livestock.
James Arcene, a Cherokee Indian, was hanged in Arkansas for participating in a robbery and murder at age 10 ; the youngest offender ever executed in the U.S.
Fortune Ferguson Jr. was executed in Florida for raping an 8-year-old girl. The Washington Post records him as 13 at the time of the crime ; the youngest offender executed in the twentieth century, according to this source. He was the first person executed in Florida's newly installed electric chair. See also: Jett (2024) for the scholarly record of his case.
George Junius Stinney Jr., 14, was electrocuted in South Carolina for the murder of an 11-year-old girl. Stinney was so small that authorities reportedly had trouble strapping him into the electric chair. His conviction was vacated by a South Carolina court in 2014.
Peak decade for juvenile executions in the United States. 53 persons were executed for crimes committed before age 18.
Last juvenile execution for 21 years.
Juvenile executions resume. Charles Rumbaugh (Texas), James Terry Roach (South Carolina), and Jay Kelly Pinkerton (Texas) were executed for crimes committed at age 17.
Key Supreme Court decisions
The Supreme Court ruled the death penalty as then applied was unconstitutional. "Evolving standards of decency which mark the progress of a maturing society" became the constitutional test.
Death penalty statutes held constitutional provided juries have adequate sentencing discretion.
A companion case to Gregg. The Court said a sentencing jury could "look to the age of the defendant" in deciding between death and life imprisonment.
Sentencing juries and judges must consider all relevant mitigating factors, including youth.
The Court declined to rule on the constitutionality of the juvenile death penalty but wrote that "youth is more than a chronological fact. It is a time and condition of life when a person may be most susceptible to influence and psychological damage."
American Bar Association adopted a resolution opposing the death penalty for crimes committed before age 18.
The Court overturned the death sentence of a defendant who committed murder at 15, but fell one vote short of barring all capital punishment for crimes committed before age 16. Justice O'Connor's concurrence was decisive. This ruling was the immediate context for the Washington Post's publication of this timeline.