youth matters at sentencing rather will macas a sixteen year old kid not unlike many sixteen year olds yet friends he had times goofed off in class but other ways he was different he was developmentally delayed he shrugged academically he felt only bias class after freshman year he dropped out of high school following a car accident on october th and th two thousand and six robert was face to face with the neighborhood drug dealer a twenty four year old adult named michael mccarthy who was threatening to kill robert and robert's family robert left to get left the party and grab his grandfather's now wooden adult with years  experience grab a gun under these circumstances would they think that dragnet gun could lead to death the consequences maybe yes but robert was a sixteen year old kid grabbing a gun under the circumstances can be was a rapidly escalating situation initiated by a car's is situation that lends itself to the type impulsive and reckless decision making characteristic of young people and has been recognized by the united states supreme court that body of wall though is now in depp's today robert is seeking leave to file a post conviction petitions that the circuit court can address the following issue did the gun have spent by the proportionate  applied to roberts to obtain leave was sent back for a sentencing hearing without the mandatory gun and ask us the court does not need to make this does that decision at this point it only needs to decide whether to docket defendant's claim for a nd stage post conviction that the p c act is designed for addressing these type of constitutional changes in an heiress the court the issue was raised on a direct appeal and the court and he raised a similar issue in a in a p r j and it was withdrawn because it was the right avenue for and that and that was similar to thompson thompson raised a miller issue in a p r jag in the court said this is c so that's what we're asking to do we're asking that the courts allow the p c act to work here and let this go forward that's for prejudice  proceedings have been different had mr womack been a look at this case law with miller been around when the so will not raise the issue and clearly there seems to be prejudice here if you look at the trial judge's order who denied leave it shows that he's uneasy with the harshness of the sentence he talks about it being denied billy harsh there's a sense when you read it that he feels like his hands are tied and he cannot provide any relief he goes on for pages about the unfairness of the sentencing laws now and but his hands are not talking this issue can be addressed on proportionate p asia and in the standard for that is whether this clip there's no basis clearly in the law for that and based on the fact that we've got cases specifically out now in validating these things it's hard to stick to you can't use it this is totally clear that he has no basis to raise this the law is in flux at this stage and it is trending towards infallibly eating these type mandatory successful does not equate to cause neither does unfairness in order to establish prejudice the claim that was not raised during me initial proceedings must so infect the trial that the to in that situation defendant must show that the penalty is degrading cruel or so wholly disproportionate to the offense that it shocks the moral community in this case that is also not present defend it was sixteen when he committed the crime there was an argument where he you know got into an argument someone left the argument when retrieved a gun came back shot the person multiple times who is now paralyzed for the rest of his life is that natural life without the possibility of parole which those cases determined that was you know those are not appropriate for people under the age of eighteen that is not present in this case so it's the people's under the illinois question it penalties clause there dissimilar barnes it was an armed robbery situation also dissimilar to those in most of the cases cited by defendant the the defendants in those cases we do receive defacto or natural life sentences under milliners progeny and we do not have that here so we would ask that you just affirm defendant's fiction you seem schemes up and set up in the ninety's into thousands have gone too far and there wasn't a way to how does this work when you're applying to juveniles and so i think th akins and barnes they suggest that they were somehow more less criminally culpable than our case but let's recognize in those cases the defendants were committing clear crimes they were one was commune armed robbery the other one was shooting not police officers that is very different we have here this is a rapidly escalating situation where the fenton is being threatened and he's sixteen years old and we have to and was that a wise decision probably not but he has a sixteen year old kid and he's faced with someone threatening him and our u s supreme court says kiran guns to protect yourself it's not outside the realm of reasonable in this that a kid would think i'm being threatened i'm going to go to get my grandpa's gun in case he comes up and tries to kill me and that's we have to remember in the st district the th district and we're not asking telling the court that we needed a ultimately decide this issue right now we're asking that this goes to nd stage that the act be allowed to work does it was intended to as the illinois supreme court's it should work have evidence you're hearing let the court bring in someone to talk about the psychology of youth get the record for defendant his background his school records let the adventure records be