Supreme Court 2007

Supreme Court and the Death Penalty
The U.S. Supreme Court will be hearing four death penalty cases in January 2007:

SCHRIRO V. LANDRIGAN, No. 05-1575
This Arizona case will be argued on January 9. The Court will decide whether defense counsel has a duty to develop and offer evidence favorable to the client in a death penalty case when the client actively opposes presentation of such mitigating evidence. On a habeas corpus petition, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit (en banc) held that Landrigan had received ineffective representation and was entitled to a new sentencing hearing.

ABDUL-KABIR V. QUARTERMAN, No. 05-11284, and BREWER V. QUARTERMAN, No. 05-11287
These two cases have been consolidated and will be argued on January 17. The basic question in both cases is whether Texas' former jury instructions allowed the jury to consider the full range of mitigating evidence that a defendant might offer, especially regarding mental impairments. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit denied relief to both defendants.

SMITH V. TEXAS, No. 05-11304
This case will be argued on the same day as the consolidated cases above, January 17. The issue again involves Texas' former jury instructions. The underlying issue in this case had been decided earlier by the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of the defendant, LaRoyce Smith, in 2004 and remanded back to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals for consideration of a new sentence. The Texas court denied Smith a resentencing because it said he had not shown "egregious harm" to his fair trial rights. The Supreme Court will decide whether the Texas court applied the proper standard of review.

The Supreme Court has already decided one capital case this term:
AYERS V. BELMONTES, No. 05-493
Argued Oct. 3, 2006; Decided Nov. 13, 2006
The Court upheld California's death penalty law in a 5-4 decision. The majority held that the state's law allowed the jury to consider all appropriate mitigating evidence, thereby overturning a ruling to the contrary by the 9th Circuit.

The Court's decision in LAWRENCE V. FLORIDA, No. 05-8820, argued Oct. 31, 2006, is pending.

On December 7, the Court accepted a new capital case, ROPER V. WEAVER, No. 06-313, which will examine the standards for when a prosecutor's argument at the penalty phase is unfairly inflammatory.

For more information on all of these cases, see Supreme Court.