News and Developments 2008: Crimes Punishable by the Death Penalty

On October 1, the U.S. Supreme Court denied Louisiana's request for a rehearing of the Court's ruling striking down the death penalty for non-homicidal offenses against individuals. Louisiana contended that a recent adjustment to military law that continued to allow the death penalty for child rape should have been taken into account by the Court, resulting in a different opinion. The Court slightly modified both the majority and dissenting opinions to include reference to the military code.

The U.S. government has decided to seek the death penalty against six Guantánamo detainees who are accused of having central roles in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The defendants will be tried before Military Commissions, which are neither part of the federal criminal justice system nor the military's justice system for its own members.

Supreme Court Asked to Review Unusual Death Sentence Attorneys for Patrick Kennedy, the only person on death row in the U.S. for a non-homicide offense, have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review whether a death sentence for a crime where the victim was not murdered is constitutional. Kennedy was convicted of raping his 8-year-old step-daughter in Louisiana in 1998.