SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — Nelson Morris was only 17 when he was arrested for a double murder that eventually doomed him to spend the rest of his life in prison, with no chance of parole.
“When you’re that age ... you can never feel safe because you’re around extremely violent circumstances,” said Morris, now 48. “There’s nothing positive in prison, so you build bonds with people that’s in similar situations with you.”
More than 20 years into his incarceration, Morris received a glimmer of hope from various court decisions, including a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that found a 14-year-old’s life sentence in another state to be unconstitutional.
