6 Supreme Court cases that could kill the death penalty

Politics, Crime, News, Rights

Spring 2015 proved to be a monumentally historic term for the U.S. Supreme Court, with pivotal decisions concerning marriage equality, censorship, search and seizure, and religious freedom.

Glossip v. Gross, a case concerning a controversial death penalty drug, flew somewhat under the radar. The Court ruled 5-4 that the incarcerated petitioners had failed to prove that lethal injections involving the controversial drug midazolam violated the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

However, two historic dissents lambasting capital punishment garnered significant attention by shedding light on aspects of the practice seemingly at odds with long-standing Eighth Amendment analysis.

In one such dissent, authored by Justice Stephen Breyer and joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, the former posed his inquiry succinctly, stating, “I would ask for full briefing on a more basic question: whether the death penalty violates the Constitution.” From there, Justice Breyer reminded us that the Eighth Amendment protects against punishments considered cruel and unusual by today’s standards as opposed to the standards at play when the Bill of Rights was originally executed.

So, what better way to analyze the death penalty under today’s standards than for the Court to hear 6 pending death penalty cases, as they plan to do this term? With ultimate rulings expected sometime in 2016, these cases and their potential impact on American laws are discussed in further detail below.

Cases to be considered

The first 3 cases to be considered in light of Glossip hail from the state of Kansas and involve 3 direct appeals from death row inmates convicted of working together to kill 5 individuals.

With oral arguments having already occurred on October 7, 2015, the Court is left to consider 2 key issues of constitutional significance in capital punishment proceedings. First, the Court will consider whether a jury must find the existence of a mitigating factor beyond reasonable doubt —a notion that could make it difficult for the accused parties to avoid the death sentence. Currently, under Kansas state law, aggravating factors must be proven beyond reasonable doubt while mitigating factors need only be presented to the jury. By applying the reasonable doubt threshold, juries would presumably have a more difficult time finding in favor of a life sentence. Secondly, the Court, after considering whether the fact that two defendants were tried together was unduly prejudicial, may order a retrial of both.

The fourth case to be considered involves a capital sentence rendered in Florida and the appellant’s contention that state court judges have too much discretion when it comes to imposing the death penalty. The case, Hurst v. Florida, raises the specific question of whether a judge—as opposed to a jury—may make factual findings concerning the existence of aggravating or mitigating factors. Generally, in any trial court proceeding, the jury is tasked with making factual determinations based on the evidence presented while the judge is responsible for making conclusions of law. However, in Florida, a judge may make factual determinations in a death penalty context—a power that opponents assert violates various principles of due process and constitutional criminal procedure.

In Foster v. Chatman, the Supreme Court will review a hot-button issue concerning discretionary, peremptory jury strikes in cases with a potential death sentence. The Georgia case involved a capital murder trial of an African American defendant accused of murdering a white victim.

The defendant alleges that during jury selection, the trial prosecutors utilized discretionary peremptory strikes to ensure that no African Americans were slated as jury members. Despite prosecutors’ claims that all African American members of the jury pool were removed for non-racial reasons, the defendant, who was ultimately sentenced to death by an all-white jury, contends that the discretionary peremptory strikes were unequivocally based on race. Moreover, counsel for the defendant uncovered jury selection notes made by the prosecution wherein all potential black jurors were highlighted and marked with the letter “B.”

Lastly, the Court has opted to review Williams v. Pennsylvania, a Pennsylvania case involving a potential conflict of interest regarding former Chief Justice Ronald Castille. According to the appellant’s complaint, years after serving as lead prosecutor in the case and helping secure the defendant’s death sentence, Castille was integral in upholding the sentence as a Supreme Court justice—despite an impassioned argument from the defendant’s counsel that the prosecution had wrongfully downplayed the victim’s history of sexually abusing the defendant.

The defendant requested that Castille recuse himself from the capital appeals process, but Castille nonetheless remained on the case and upheld the conviction he helped bring about years before. Now, the defendant is asking the Supreme Court to overturn his sentence and remand for a new, unbiased review.

In light of this extensive upcoming judicial review of the American punitive system, will the Supreme Court finally put capital punishment to death? Stay tuned to find out—we may be headed for another historic term.

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