Life is unfair

The loss of a child represents the greatest suffering any parent could possibly endure.

On May 22, 1995, Judie and Jim of Agoura Hills lost their 16-year-old son to a murderer’s knife in a backyard brawl that involved machismo, alcohol and drugs.

The boy’s murder was a needless crime that demanded the harshest of penalties for the person who stabbed him, 18-year-old Jason Holland.

Now serving life without parole in state prison, Holland is paying his debt to society. Holland’s 15-year-old brother, Micah, a known troublemaker, received 25-years-to-life for his role in the altercation.

But the sentences given to two other accomplices, teenagers Brandon Hein and Tony Miliotti, resulted from a troubling law known as the felony murder rule, which defies any notion that the penalty should fit the crime.

Under the law, not one, but all the teens were held liable for Farris’ death because it occurred during the commission of a robbery. But no evidence ever supported the theory that they were out to steal marijuana.

Like Holland, both Hein and Miliotti were sentenced to life without parole, though neither had an inkling that a knifing would occur. Miliotti reportedly only watched while the fight took place.

Neither Hein nor Miliotti were innocent bystanders, to be sure. Both made unwise choices that fateful day that all parents of teenagers dread.

But to lock the door and throw away the key on a pair of boys who spent a single afternoon on the fringe of the law is an affront to the concept of rehabilitative justice.

Teens who aren’t hardened criminals and who, according to many experts, committed manslaughter or second degree murder at worst, shouldn’t spend the rest of their lives in prison. We urge the state Appellate Court, which is now hearing an appeal in the case, to give Hein and Miliotti a shot at parole after serving an appropriate sentence in prison.

Life cannot be returned to Jimmy Farris, but it shouldn’t be taken away from Hein and Miliotti.