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posted by takyon on Sunday December 11 2016, @05:57PM   Printer-friendly
from the deathlock dept.

An Alabama inmate was put to death by lethal injection on Thursday after a deadlocked Supreme Court refused to stay his execution, The Associated Press reported. The inmate, Ronald B. Smith, had been sentenced to death by a judge despite a jury's recommendation of life without parole.

Mr. Smith was convicted in 1995 of murdering Casey Wilson, a convenience store clerk, the previous year. By a vote of 7 to 5, the jury rejected the death penalty and recommended a sentence of life without parole. The judge overrode that recommendation, sentencing Mr. Smith to death.

[...] In January, the Supreme Court struck down Florida's capital sentencing system, which also allowed judicial overrides of jury recommendations of life sentences. "The Sixth Amendment requires a jury, not a judge, to find each fact necessary to impose a sentence of death,"

Should judges be allowed to overrule a jury's decision for sentencing?

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/08/us/politics/alabama-ronald-bert-smith-execution-supreme-court.html?0p19G=c&_r=0


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 11 2016, @11:50PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 11 2016, @11:50PM (#440125)

    That all persons 12 and over should partake of single life FPSing until the whole situation is under control :)