Case ID: so2d_454/html/1119-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "DIXON, Chief Justice and CALOGERO, Justice,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

STATE of Louisiana ex rel. Timothy George BALDWIN v. Frank BLACKBURN, Warden, Louisiana State Penitentiary.
    No. 84-KP-1631.
    Supreme Court of Louisiana.
    Sept. 5, 1984.
   In Re: Baldwin, Timothy George, Applying for Writ of Review, Stay of Execution, Supervisory Writs and Writ of Habeas Corpus Parish of Ouachita 4th Judicial District Court Div. “E” Number 38,292

Denied.

DIXON, Chief Justice and CALOGERO, Justice,

additionally assign the following reasons concurring in the denial:

United States v. Jackson, 390 U.S. 570, 88 S.Ct. 1209, 20 L.Ed.2d 138 (1968), upon which relator relies, “did not hold, as subsequent decisions have made clear, that the Constitution forbids every government imposed choice in the criminal process that has the effect of discouraging the exercise of constitutional rights.... ” Chaffin v. Stynchcombe, 412 U.S. 17, 93 S.Ct. 1977, 36 L.Ed.2d 714 (1973).

Relator’s further contention, that the constitutionally permissible capital sentencing scheme is offended by allowing defendants who might best .qualify for the death sentence to avoid exposure thereto by the simple expedient of pleading guilty to second degree murder (by allowance of the prosecutor) is not meritorious, for the practice complained of does not appear to violate standards for a constitutional death penalty as established by the United States Supreme Court.