Deal v. Commissioner of Correction

This case is before us on the reservation and report of the single justice. The petitioners, Timothy Deal, Siegfried Golston, and Jeffrey Roberto, are juvenile homicide offenders 4 who are serving mandatory indeterminate life sentences and who have a constitutional right to a “meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation.” Diatchenko v. District Attorney for the Suffolk Dist., 466 Mass. 655, 674 (2013) (Diatchenko I), quoting Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 75 (2010). This right also extends to juveniles convicted of murder in the second degree.…