Title: The Debate on Whether Life Sentences Should Be Considered: Will Missouri's Proportionality Review Remain Meaningful?
Abstract: I. INTRODUCTION To ensure that the imposition of death sentences is not the result of an aberrant jury, appellate courts may engage in death penalty by comparing the facts of a case to prior factually similar cases. (1) If the court determines that a death sentence proves proportionate to sentences imposed in prior similar cases, the court affirms the imposition of the death penalty. (2) If the court determines that a death sentence is not proportionate, the court vacates the sentence. The Supreme Court of Missouri engages in statutorily-required proportionality for every sentence of death. (3) However, the specifics of how to engage in proportionality have been, and continue to be, a point of contention for the court. From 1981 to 1987, when determining whether the death sentence before it proved proportional to the sentences in other factually similar capital cases, the Supreme Court of Missouri considered affirmed, factually similar cases that resulted in either life imprisonment or a death sentence. (4) The court later decided to consider only affirmed, factually similar cases that resulted in a death sentence. (5) More recently, the court has returned to the practice of considering both factually similar cases that resulted in either life imprisonment or a death sentence. (6) Therefore, since 1977, the Supreme Court of Missouri varied its approach to which category of cases must be considered. (7) The court addressed these variations in its application of proportionality in State v. Deck, leaving the question unanswered. (8) The court split three to three on whether similar capital cases that resulted in a life sentence must be considered under Missouri's proportionality statute, with a seventh judge concurring only in the result. (9) This Law Summary will address the Supreme Court of Missouri's proportionality jurisprudence, (10) the rationales of two opinions in Deck, (11) and the relationship of the Deck opinions to precedent and public policy. (12) Additionally, this Summary will address the court's subsequent application of and debate about proportionality as well as the legislative response. (13) Finally, this Summary will conclude that for proportionality to serve a meaningful function, the court must consider all affirmed, factually similar capital cases that resulted in either life imprisonment or a death sentence because only considering factually similar cases which resulted in the death penalty essentially guarantees a finding of proportionality. (14) II. LEGAL BACKGROUND First, to provide a framework for Missouri's death penalty scheme, this section will discuss the seminal death penalty decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. Second, this section will demonstrate how the Supreme Court of the United States' favorable opinion of proportionality impacted Missouri's legislative enactments. Third and finally, this section will examine how the Supreme Court of Missouri has interpreted and applied the proportionality legislation in capital cases. A. Seminal Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States In 1972, the Supreme Court of the United States decided the seminal case of Furman v. Georgia, (15) in which the Court held that for a state death penalty scheme to be constitutional, the scheme must provide safeguards against arbitrary and capricious application of the death penalty. (16) The Court also suggested that all current state death penalty statutes were unconstitutional because they allowed for arbitrariness. (17) As a result, state legislatures nationwide began drafting new death penalty schemes. (18) Just four years later, in Gregg v. Georgia, (19) the Court analyzed a state death penalty scheme that attempted to satisfy the requirements of Furman, (20) The new death penalty scheme required that the state supreme court review every death sentence to determine whether . …
Publication Year: 2012
Publication Date: 2012-06-22
Language: en
Type: article
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