| Ring v Arizona 01-488 in PDF format | Ring v Arizona 01-488 in html |
| Press Releases As Groups React |
WATCH/LISTEN THIS STORY: The
BBC's Rob Watson
"What you might see is some of these people still being sentenced to death"
US court overturns death sentences
BBC News: Monday, 24 June, 2002.
BBC News: The fate of at least 150 killers could be
affected
The US Supreme Court has overturned death sentences against dozens
of convicted killers, ruling that juries and not judges must make the decisions.
The 7-2 ruling affects the way death sentences are imposed
in Arizona and at least four other states, with implications for the fate
of more than 150 killers - and possibly as many as 800.
Their death sentences could now be commuted
to life imprisonment.
About 3,700 people currently await execution
across the United States, although most of
them will still be put to death.
The court ruled that a sentence imposed by a
judge violates a defendant's constitutional
right to a trial by jury.
The states affected have previously allowed
juries only to determine the guilt or innocence
of defendants, while judges decided whether
there were aggravating factors meriting the
death penalty.
Opponents of the death penalty are delighted,
particularly as this is the second Supreme Court
verdict curbing the use of capital punishment in less than a week.
On Thursday, the court ruled that executing
mentally disabled killers was unconstitutional
because it was "cruel and unusual" punishment.
Restricting move
The two decisions do not mean that the
Supreme Court justices are moving towards
outlawing the death penalty, says the BBC's
Washington correspondent Justin Webb.
But they are showing a willingness to curb its
use where legal or social arguments are
compelling, he says.
Monday's Supreme Court ruling will immediately
apply in that state and in Idaho and Montana,
where a single judge decides the sentence.
It will also apply immediately in Colorado and Nebraska, where a
panel of judges makes the sentencing decision.
In four other states - Alabama, Delaware, Florida and Indiana
- where juries make sentencing recommendations, but
judges have the final decision, death-row inmates may also
challenge their sentences.
Ring v Arizona
The Supreme Court was considering the case
of an Arizona inmate, which rested on the fact
that nine of the 38 states which retain the
death penalty leave sentencing up to judges,
rather than jurors.
The ruling is a victory for Timothy Stuart Ring,
who was sentenced to death by an Arizona
judge for the 1994 killing of a security guard in
Phoenix.
After the verdict, the jury was discharged.
The judge at a separate hearing said Ring
deserved the death penalty after finding two
aggravating circumstances - committing the
murder for financial gain and carrying it out in
an especially heinous way.
Ring's lawyers argued the Arizona death
penalty law was put in doubt by a Supreme
Court ruling two years ago that overturned a
hate crime sentence imposed by a judge on a
New Jersey man.
Three Florida death row inmates - Amos King,
Linroy Bottoson and Robert Trease - were
given a stay of execution pending the outcome
of Ring v Arizona.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The
Supreme Court overturned the death
sentence laws of five states
Monday, affecting more than 160 death row
inmates, by ruling that
juries and not judges must make life-or-death
determinations about the
fate of convicted killers.
The 7-2 ruling means that executions ordered
for 168 people will be reconsidered, although it
is not clear how the affected states will
respond.
The decision concerned instances in which
juries determined defendants' guilt or innocence
and judges alone decided their punishment. The
court held that such sentences violate
defendants' constitutional right to trial by jury,
rejecting the argument that judges can be more
evenhanded.
"The Sixth Amendment jury trial right ... does
not turn on the relative rationality, fairness or
efficiency of potential fact-finders," Justice Ruth
Bader Ginsburg ( news - web sites) wrote for a
majority that included an unusual alliance of
conservative and liberal-leaning justices.
In some states juries determine guilt or
innocence, but a judge then bases a death
sentence on aggravating factors such as the
heinous nature of a murder or whether it was
committed for monetary gain.
Monday's was the second
major Supreme Court ruling in less than a week
affecting the ways that
states sentence people to death. Last week, the
justices voted 6-3 to
exempt mentally retarded people from execution.
Neither of the cases
attacked the basic constitutionality of capital
punishment for the general
population.
Nationwide, about 3,700
people await execution for crimes committed in
the 38 states that allow
the death penalty.
Monday's ruling turned
on the Constitution's guarantee of a jury of one's
peers and a Supreme Court
ruling two years ago that struck down another
kind of sentence determined
by a judge instead of a jury.
Ginsburg said the court's
2000 ruling in a case called Apprendi v. New
Jersey cannot be reconciled
with the death penalty sentencing laws in
Arizona and four other
states in which one or more judges impose the
sentence.
The Apprendi case concerned
a judge's ability to lengthen a sentence by
two years if a crime was
determined to be a hate crime. The high court
struck down that sentencing
law.
"We hold that the Sixth Amendment secures to capital defendants, no less than to noncapital defendants, the right to a jury determination of any fact on which the legislature conditions an increase in their maximum punishment," Ginsburg said in announcing Monday's decision from the bench.
"We hold that the Sixth Amendment applies to both" cases, Ginsburg wrote.
She was joined by Justices
John Paul Stevens ( news - web sites), Antonin Scalia ( news - web sites),
Anthony M. Kennedy, David
H. Souter and Clarence Thomas ( news - web sites). Justice Stephen
Breyer ( news - web sites)
wrote separately to agree with the outcome.
The case concerned an
Arizona inmate, and the ruling will immediately apply in that state and in
Idaho
and Montana, where a single
judge decides the sentence. It will also apply immediately in Colorado and
Nebraska, where a panel
of judges makes the sentencing decision.
It was not immediately
clear what will happen to inmates in those states. Some lawyers have said
death
row inmates' sentences
could be commuted to life in prison, as was done when the Supreme Court put
a temporary halt to the death penalty in the 1970s. Or the inmates could
be resentenced, with some
receiving death sentences
all over again.
Also unclear was whether
the ruling will have a spillover effect in four other states in which juries
only
recommend whether a convicted
murderer should receive the death penalty or life in prison: Florida,
Alabama, Indiana, and
Delaware.
A judge makes the final
call in those states. Indiana, however, recently passed a law that will require
judges to follow a jury's
sentencing recommendations.
In dissent, Justice
Sandra Day O'Connor ( news - web sites) predicted that many inmates in the
additional four states
will challenge their sentences now.
The earlier Apprendi
ruling "had a severely destabilizing effect on our criminal justice system,"
O'Connor
wrote in a dissent joined
by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. "The decision today is only going
to add to these already serious effects."
Arizona has 129 people
on death row, Idaho 21 and Montana six. Colorado has five, and Nebraska
seven. Florida has 383,
Alabama 187, Indiana 39 and Delaware 20.
Timothy Stuart Ring,
the Arizona death row inmate at the heart of Monday's case, was convicted
of
killing an armored car
driver during a 1994 robbery in Phoenix.
Ring challenged his
sentence and Arizona's law on grounds that his constitutional right to a
jury was
violated when a judge held
a separate hearing after the jury that convicted Ring was dismissed.
At the sentencing hearing, an accomplice testified that Ring planned the robbery and murdered the guard. The judge then determined that the aggravating factors warranted death.
"I was essentially given
two trials," Ring said in an Associated Press interview earlier this year.
"One
before a jury and then
one before a judge."
The Arizona Supreme Court rejected Ring's constitutional challenge last year.
Ring's case put the
court in an awkward position. The high court had already upheld the constitutionality
of Arizona's law in 1990,
but that was before its ruling in Apprendi v. New Jersey.
Finding the two rulings
irreconcilable, the high court took the rare step of overturning one of its
own fairly
recent decisions. The
first decision was written by O'Connor, who defended it in her dissent Monday.
The case is Ring v. Arizona, 01-488.
WASHINGTON (Reuters)
- The U.S. Supreme Court ( news - web
sites) said on Monday only
juries -- and not judges -- can impose the
death sentence, the second
important capital punishment ruling in four
days and one that may
affect nearly 800 death-row inmates in nine states.
Reversing itself, the high court by a 7-2 vote
overturned its 1990 decision that upheld an
Arizona capital sentencing law that gave sole
responsibility to the judge to make factual
findings necessary to sentence a convicted
murderer to death.
The ruling followed a landmark decision on
Thursday when the high court outlawed
executions of the mentally retarded in capital
cases -- a ruling that struck down laws in 20
states and that may spare hundreds of
death-row inmates.
The pair of rulings were surprising for a
conservative-controlled court that has generally
upheld the death penalty and came at a time of
growing national debate about capital
punishment.
"This case presents
a question of who decides: judge or jury. The context
is capital murder, the
issue, life or death," said Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg ( news - web
sites) in announcing the latest ruling from the
bench.
"Capital defendants,
no less than noncapital defendants, we conclude, are
entitled to a jury determination
of any fact on which the legislature
conditions an increase
in their maximum punishment," she said.
The ruling could affect
the death sentences of nearly 800 inmates,
accounting for more than
a fifth of the national total exceeding 3,700, in
nine states, death penalty
opponents said.
"Today's decision potentially
affects hundreds of death-row inmates and
demonstrates how important
it has become to review the entire capital
punishment process," said
Richard Dieter of the Death Penalty
Information Center.
In dissent, Justice
Sandra Day O'Connor ( news - web sites) said the
decision effectively declared
unconstitutional capital sentencing schemes
in five states with 168
prisoners on death row.
In those five states
-- Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana and Nebraska --
judges impose the sentence
in capital cases.
O'Connor said she believed
many of the challenges by the death-row
inmates would be unsuccessful,
but warned that the need to evaluate their
claims "will greatly burden
the courts in these five states."
O'Connor also said death-row
inmates in four other states, where juries make sentencing
recommendations but judges
have the final decision, may also challenge their sentences.
Those four states --
Alabama, Delaware, Florida and Indiana -- have 629 inmates on death row, death
penalty foes said.
In the 29 other states
with the death penalty and in the federal system, juries determine whether
aggravating factors exist
and weigh those against any mitigating circumstances.
ARIZONA MURDER CASE
The ruling represented
a victory for Timothy Stuart Ring, who was sentenced to death by an Arizona
judge for the 1994 killing
of an armored van driver in Phoenix.
After being convicted,
the judge at a separate hearing said Ring deserved the death penalty after
finding
two aggravating circumstances
-- committing the murder for financial gain and carrying it out in an
especially heinous way.
His lawyers argued the Arizona death penalty law was put in doubt by a ruling in 2000 when the Supreme Court said a jury must assess facts that increase the penalties for a criminal defendant.
Ginsburg said the court overruled its 1990 ruling that upheld Arizona's death penalty system.
She acknowledged that
the court usually adhered to its past rulings. "But the doctrine is not unyielding;
we have overruled prior
decisions when there is strong reason for setting the law straight. This
is such a
case," she said.
Ginsburg rejected as
"unpersuasive" Arizona's argument that a judge may be a better way to guarantee
against the arbitrary imposition
of the death penalty.
Only O'Connor and Chief Justice William Rehnquist ( news - web sites) dissented.
O'Connor said the 2000
decision should have been the one overruled. It has cast doubt on countless
criminal sentences and
caused an "enormous" increase in the workload of an already overburdened
judiciary, she said.
She said Monday's decision "exacerbates the harm" done by the 2000 ruling.
In another ruling on
who decides, the court by a 5-4 vote said that under federal law brandishing
and
discharging a gun during
a drug offense was a sentencing factor to be decided by the judge, not an
element of a crime to
be found by the jury.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court agreed
Friday to decide whether
it is constitutional for a judge, not a jury,
to decide if a convicted murderer
receives a death sentence.
The court's decision could affect nearly 800 death sentences in nine states.
The court is expected to decide this year
whether a defendant's constitutional
right to a jury trial also means that only
a jury can decide a death sentence.
Currently, although juries are responsible
for deciding guilt or innocence,
judges decide the sentence in Arizona and
eight other states.
It is the third death penalty case
the court has accepted for the current term,
and the second in which the court will reconsider
its own earlier rulings.
It isn't clear how far the court
would go, but it is an important case and it could
mean a major change in the law and in lives,''
said Richard Dieter, executive
director of the Death Penalty Information
Center.
If the court overturns an Arizona man's death
sentence, as many as 795 other
sentences nationwide could be suspect. The
court could also confine its
review to the way sentences are imposed in
Arizona and two other states
with nearly identical rules, meaning far
fewer death sentences would be
affected.
The case is a follow-up to a 2000 decision, little noticed at the time, in which the court overturned a hate crime sentence imposed on a New Jersey man. The man's sentence was lengthened by a judge after the trial, based on sentencing rules that tacked on additional prison time if a judge found, among other things, that a given crime was a hate crime.
The system amounted to a judge acting as
a jury, the Supreme Court found.
Scores of federal inmates have since claimed
that their sentences should be overturned in light of that case, called Apprendi
v. New Jersey.
In Friday's case, the court said it will review the sentence imposed on Timothy Stuart Ring for the 1994 killing of an armored van driver in Phoenix.
At issue is Arizona's requirement that a trial judge decide whether a particular case involves "aggravating circumstances'' that justify imposition of a death sentence for a convicted defendant.
Aggravating circumstances include whether a murder was especially heinous, cruel or depraved and whether it was committed for monetary gain.
In Ring's case, the judge found an aggravating
circumstance based on
an accomplice's testimony during a sentencing
hearing. The jury portion of
Ring's trial was already over when the accomplice
described Ring as the ringleader of the Wells Fargo robbery, and as the person
who actually
shot the driver.
The U.S. Supreme Court upheld Arizona's
aggravated-circumstance
system in 1990, and has now agreed to decide
if that decision can be
reconciled with the Apprendi ruling.
The Arizona Supreme Court rejected Ring's
constitutional challenge
last year. The state has 128 people on Death
Row.
Idaho and Montana have systems like Arizona's,
where a single judge
decides the sentence. Idaho has 20 people
on Death Row, and Montana
has six.
In four states, juries only recommend whether
a convicted murderer
should receive the death penalty or life
in prison. A judge makes the final
call in those states: Florida, with 385 people
on Death Row as of late 2001; Alabama with 188; Indiana with 39; and Delaware
with 17.
In Colorado and Nebraska, a panel of judges
makes the sentencing
decision. Each state has six people on Death
Row.
Nationwide, about 3,700 people await death
for crimes committed in
the 38 states that allow the death penalty.
The case is Ring v. Arizona, 01-488.
Legal Update From Capital Defense Weekly :
Ring v. Arizona, discussed in passing in
the last edition, appears to be
blooming into a potential landmark decision
by the Supreme Court.
The Question
in Ring is:
Walton
v. Arizona, 497 U.S. 639 (1990), held that Arizona’s capital sentencing statute,
which
assigns solely to the trial judge the responsibility for making the findings
of fact
which
are necessary to subject a defendant to a death sentence, does not contravene
the
Sixth Amendment’s jury-trial right as made applicable to the States through
the
Fourteenth
Amendment’s Due Process Clause.
http://coramnobis.com/briefs/ringcertpetword.doc
(Tim's Cert Petition, in
Word) and as a PDF File - http://coramnobis.com/briefs/ringcertpetitionpdf.pdf
The Oppositon Brief in Word : http://coramnobis.com/briefs/ringcertoppoword.doc
Ring Cert Reply In Word
: http://coramnobis.com/briefs/ringreplybriefword.doc
in PDF: http://coramnobis.com/briefs/ringcertreplypdf.pdf
| Press Releases As Groups React |
