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Juvenile lifer followed court cases in hopes of freedom

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Sharon Wiggins was the longest-serving female juvenile lifer in Pennsylvania, sentenced to life without parole for first-degree murder committed at age 17. Last summer, when the U.S. Supreme Court made mandatory sentences of life without parole for juveniles unconstitutional, she finally had a glimmer of hope, but she didn’t make it. Wiggins died March 24 of a heart attack. "This has a real cost," said Sara Jacobson, a law professor at Temple, who worked on Wiggins' case. "The delay matters. She's not the only one we may lose along the way."