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continued from page 13
“I am a bulldog for my
clients. The state has the
burden of proving its case;
if it cannot do that, then my
client should go free. I feel
protective of my clients.”
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Alona Sharon works in her Royal Oak law office filled with case files.
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14 December 1 • 2016
Congregation Or Chadash in Oak Park,
where she serves on the board.
Sharon has a solo practice in Royal
Oak, dedicated to the defense of those
accused of crimes such as drunk driving,
sex offenses or murder. She went entirely
into solo practice, at her husband’s advice,
so she could give her clients the time and
respect they deserve.
“I am eternally grateful for his unwav-
ering confidence in my ability to be suc-
cessful on my own, his patience while I
built this practice and made very little
money, his pride and excitement when
the money started rolling in and his
complete lack of an ego that allows me to
shine.”
Sharon says she thanks her husband
every day. “Without him,” she says, “I
would not have had the opportunity to
start and build this practice.”
She describes her practice this way: “I
am a bulldog for my clients. The state has
the burden of proving its case; if it cannot
do that, then my client should go free. I
feel protective of my clients.
“It can be frustrating. Sometimes my
clients make bad choices; but I do not
hide from them — they all have my cell
phone number, and they know they can
call me any day, any time of day or night,
except Shabbos and Yom Tov. I answer
their calls even when I am on vacation.”
Is Sharon still working on pro bono
projects. Yes, but she is not doing
Clemency Project cases now because she
is working on two time-consuming juve-
nile lifer cases.
In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court decid-
ed in Miller v. Alabama that sentencing
a child to mandatory life without parole
is an unconstitutional and excessive pun-
ishment. In January 2016, the court, in
Montgomery v. Louisiana, held the Miller
decision was retroactive to all juveniles.
The combination of those two deci-
sions has made the 300-some juvenile
lifers in Michigan eligible for resentenc-
ing. This August, each local prosecutor
was required to file a notice if he or she
intended to seek a life without parole sen-
tence for a particular juvenile lifer.
Although the U.S. Supreme Court has
directed that mandatory life sentences
should be reserved for those “rare chil-
dren whose crimes reflect irreparable cor-
ruption,” who exhibit “such irretrievable
depravity that rehabilitation is impos-
sible and life without parole is justified,”
Michigan prosecutors have sought to
re-impose life without parole for over 60
percent of the state’s juvenile lifers.
The goal in these cases is to persuade
the presiding judge to impose a term-
of-years sentence so eventually they will
be parole-eligible rather than having the
judge impose life without parole again.
She notes, though the courts may even-
tually award some payments for attorneys
for this work, she does this because it is
close to her heart.
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