Tia Lyons
Staff Writer
MAGNOLIA — A Norphlet man who was sentenced to life in prison as a teen in the 1994 slaying of a pregnant woman in a local sandwich shop is expected to appear today in a Magnolia court to revisit his sentencing in the capital murder case.
Now 38, Steven W. Miller is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole in the Varner Supermax facility of the Arkansas Department of Correction.
Miller was convicted of shooting 21-year-old Alpha Leona Cameron to death during a robbery at Subway 22 years ago.
The shop was then located at 1227 W. Hillsboro.
Miller, 16 at the time, and an accomplice, Heath Kennedy, who was 18 then and also from Norphlet, were accused of robbing the store and shooting Cameron — the lone employee who was working there on the night of March 5, 1994 — after she complied with their demands to hand over money from the cash register.
According to information obtained from the News-Times’ archives, Cameron, of El Dorado, was shot execution-style, twice in the head. El Dorado police discovered her body in the storage room of the business.
She had been working at Subway for just two weeks and was pregnant with her fourth child at the time she was murdered.
Kennedy, who reportedly acted as lookout during the robbery, was convicted of capital murder in December 1994.
Like Miller, Kennedy was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Kennedy was granted a change of venue for his trial.
Proceedings were moved to Circuit Court in Magnolia, where he was found guilty of capital murder in 1996.
David Butler, prosecuting attorney for the 13th Judicial District, said Miller is scheduled for an appearance today for consideration of a resentencing trial.
In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that laws requiring life prison sentences for youthful offenders on felony charges violate the eighth Constitutional Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment.
The Supreme Court initially made the decision while considering a different case in 2010, but applicable felony offenses did not include murder six years ago.
The 2012 ruling set a new precedent that added murder to the applicable offenses and barred automatic, mandatory life sentences for juvenile defendants.
One of the plaintiffs in the case (Miller v. Alabama) that prompted the 2012 ruling was an Arkansas man.
Kuntrell Jackson, 30, was 14 when he was charged with serving as a lookout for two older teenage accomplices, one of them his cousin, during the robbery of a Blytheville video store in 1999.
One of the older teens shot and killed a store clerk, and Jackson was subsequently tried and convicted as an adult.
He was originally sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Due to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in 2012, the Arkansas Supreme Court agreed in 2013 that Jackson was eligible for a new sentencing hearing.
He is now serving a sentence of 240 months for first-degree murder.
“Mandatory life without parole for a juvenile precludes consideration of his chronological age and its hallmark features — among them, immaturity, impetuosity, and failure to appreciate risks and consequences,” U.S. Justice Elena Kagan wrote in 2012. “It prevents taking into account the family and home environment that surrounds him — and from which he cannot usually extricate himself — no matter how brutal or dysfunctional.”
Jackson was eligible for parole in April 2015 but the Arkansas Board of Parole denied his early release.
In 2015, the Arkansas Supreme Court addressed the impact of the 2012 ruling on the state, with state justices agreeing that the High Court’s decision applies to every inmate who is serving a life sentence in an Arkansas prison on convictions of felony crimes that were committed when they were teenagers under 18.
Butler said rulings by both courts affected four cases in the 13th Judicial District, one of them for a crime that occurred in Union County but was tried in Columbia County — Miller’s.
Of the other cases, two are tied to Columbia County and the other to Ouachita County.
All of the defendants — Miller, Richard Hill (Ouachita County, capital and murder aggravated robbery, 2000) and William Davis and Matthew Elliott (both capital murder, Columbia County, 2000) — are scheduled for resentencing hearings today in Magnolia.
Butler said the court is expected to handle preliminary matters today.
“The court is going to ascertain whether the defendants will hire a lawyer or be appointed one, and set up scheduling,” Butler said.
He said the attorneys will be allowed time to confer with their clients and return to the court later “and tell us what you want to do.”
Should resentencing trials be granted before a jury, Butler said each side will need time to prepare, explaining that though the defendants have already been found guilty, the cases will likely have to be presented in their entirety to jurors.
Defendants would also have the option of taking a plea, Butler said.
He noted that revisiting the sentencing portion of the cases does not guarantee that new sentences will be granted.
Tia Lyons may be contacted at 870-862-6611 or by email at tlyons@ eldoradonews.com.