by Kent Scheidegger · Jun 17, 2020 1:55 pm
The Supreme Court yesterday stayed the execution of Texas murderer Rubin Gutierrez. And what did the State of Texas do to warrant this last-minute interference with the execution of a very thoroughly reviewed judgment? They did exactly what Justice Kavanaugh said last year was a perfectly acceptable solution to the problem.
by Kent Scheidegger · May 26, 2020 2:25 pm
Until fairly recently, the Florida Supreme Court seemed determined to maximize the damage caused by new pronouncements from the U.S. Supreme Court in capital cases. One such error was corrected in January. Another one was corrected last week.
In 1982, Probation Supervisor Bjorn Svenson was ambushed by one of his parolees, who emptied his weapon into Supervisor Svenson, reloaded, and shot him twice more. The murderer’s latest attempt to escape long-overdue justice was shot down by the Florida Supreme Court last Thursday.
by Kent Scheidegger · May 15, 2020 11:28 am
Last month, a splintered three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated an injunction against executions issued by the D.C. District Court. See this post. Today, the court turned down the murderers’ request to rehear the case before all the active judges (except for CJ Srinivasan, who is recused). No judge of the court even called for a vote on it. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · May 14, 2020 11:46 am
The capital murder case of the notorious Scott Peterson has finally been set for oral argument, 15 years after judgment in the trial court. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Apr 7, 2020 10:10 am
Last November, a federal district judge in DC enjoined all federal executions based on a statute requiring use of the “manner” of execution provided by the law of the state where the conviction was rendered. See this post. Today, a splintered three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated the injunction, for now. The division on the panel clearly requires further review, and the court on its own motion stayed the issuance of its mandate to allow it. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Mar 24, 2020 11:17 am
Today the Governor of Colorado signed the bill repealing the death penalty. Repeal is a subject that reasonable people can and do disagree on. However, in a shameless act of legislative cowardice, the Legislature put a patently false declaration in the bill for the sole purpose of defeating the power of referendum that the people of Colorado have reserved to themselves. For that, every legislator who voted for this bill deserves to be defeated at their next election. Continue reading . . .
by Kent Scheidegger · Mar 20, 2020 2:20 pm
Raymond Mata is very justly sentenced to death for the murder of 3-year-old Adam Gomez. (I have reserved the stomach-turning facts for the end of the post.) He has the right to government-paid counsel to make his defense, but shouldn’t the government insist on some kind of threshold of non-frivolousness before it forks over taxpayers dollars? Do we really need to pay for complete garbage? That is exactly what Nebraskans have paid for in Mata’s latest petition to the U.S. Supreme Court.
by Kent Scheidegger · Feb 27, 2020 1:54 pm
The Federalist Society has a podcast on McKinney v. Arizona by Arizona Solicitor General O.H. Skinner, who argued the case for the State.
by Kent Scheidegger · Feb 25, 2020 4:37 pm
Earlier this month we noted the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s pilot program to disperse death-sentenced inmates away from death row. This authority was given to CDCR in Proposition 66 to defuse the abolition advocates’ argument that keeping them in San Quentin was much more expensive than it would cost to house the same murderers if they were not sentenced to death. CDCR now has an information page on its website further explaining the pilot program.
by Kent Scheidegger · Feb 25, 2020 11:33 am
Today the U.S. Supreme Court decided two major issues in capital litigation in McKinney v. Arizona. The Court affirmed that the jury trial requirement of Ring v. Arizona applies only to the finding of an aggravating circumstance that makes a defendant eligible for the death penalty, not to the weighing process or the final sentencing decision.
The Court also reaffirmed that a state appellate court may fix a problem at trial regarding the aggravating and mitigating circumstances by reweighing them itself, rather than sending the case back for a new sentencing hearing.
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