How to Support Cyntoia Brown : Colorlines

How to Support Cyntoia Brown
Colorlines by Ayana Byrd
December 10, 2018

Sentenced to life in prison at 16 for killing her would-be rapist, Brown is not eligible for parole until she is 67.  

In the unanimous decision, the state court ruled that juvenile offenders facing life, like Brown, must serve five decades before being considered for parole.  

Brown is in the Tennessee Prison for Women for shooting Johnny Allen in 2004. At the time of the incident, she was a 16-year-old who had been forced into prostitution. Allen, 43, picked her up at a Sonic drive-in and drove her back to his house, which had guns on display. Brown maintains that she killed him with a gun from her purse in an act of self-defense. Prosecutors in her trial countered that she went to Allen’s house to rob him. 

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