After being sentenced as an adult at 13, Michael Lewis, now 40, is home
In November 1997, Lewis was among the first and youngest children to face charges under SB440, mandating minors as young as 13 be tried as adults for committing certain offenses.
One of Georgia’s youngest juveniles sentenced to an adult prison is home after 26 years behind bars.
Michael “Little B” Lewis, now 40, left the Macon Transitional Facility on Wednesday morning after the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles granted him provisional release last year. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he was 13 when he became the face of Georgia’s tough-on-crime policies more than two decades ago.
“There are a lot of things I’ve never done because I was a child when I came in,” Lewis said.
The Fulton County district attorney’s office charged Lewis in February 1997 with the shooting death of 23-year-old Darnell Woods, who was killed in a parked automobile outside a convenience store in Atlanta with his two young sons in the backseat. Fulton County DA Paul Howard and his office felt strongly about trying Lewis as an adult then.
In November 1997, Lewis was among the first and youngest children to face charges under SB440, a law passed three years prior mandating that minors as young as 13 be recognized as adults and prosecuted in Superior Court for committing certain severe offenses.
He received a life sentence for malice murder, making him eligible for release after 14 years, and served his sentence at the “high security” Lee Arrendale State Prison adult correctional facility.
In 2003, “The Condemnation of Little B,” a book by activist and former Black Panther Party chairperson Elaine Brown examining the teen’s maligning at trial and the multiple systems that failed him, attracted national attention for Lewis’ case, revealing him as a school dropout with an absent father and mother addicted to crack cocaine.
The Georgia Division of Family and Children Services had intervened in 1995, but he was already bouncing from home to home. News publications described him as a thug and evil.
Brown cited numerous factors for Lewis’ mistreatment, including the juvenile super-predators craze of the 1990s, new national and statewide tough-on-crime legislation, a power-hungry prosecutor and a city eager to project a safe and inviting image in the aftermath of the U.S. Olympics. She claimed all were prepared to sacrifice a 13-year-old child to deliver a political point.
Lewis became eligible for parole in 2011, yet was refused that year, in 2016 and in 2020. He was given provisional parole in June 2022 and found out about the parole certificate this month. The board did not comment on what led to Lewis’ release, citing a policy prohibiting it from commenting on particular instances.
“I have an idea of it, but I don’t know what to expect,” Lewis said of his newfound freedom. “I’ve never been outside of Georgia. I’ve been all around Georgia incarcerated, but I’ve never been out of the state. So, I’m ready.”
Brown — whom Lewis refers to as his mother — and his Atlanta attorney, Leigh Schrope, met him outside the prison Wednesday. Shortly after, he and Brown headed to Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport for his first plane ride, which was to the San Francisco Bay Area.
Lewis will help run the neighborhood market at Brown’s nonprofit Oakland and the World Enterprises, which is building a mixed-used affordable housing development. He is optimistic and enthusiastic about the future.
“I told him I am gonna be with you until you get out,” Brown recalled, AJC reported. “He had nobody. He was a piece of garbage. So I decided to take up his case.”
TheGrio is FREE on your TV via Apple TV, Amazon Fire, Roku and Android TV. Also, please download theGrio mobile apps today!
