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Page Number: 307.0

146 

SMITH  v.  SPISAK 

Opinion of the Court 

marked ‘yes’ in Section II outweigh the aggravating cir­
cumstances  marked  ‘yes’  in  Section  I.”  Id.,  at  388–389 
(emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted). 

Explaining  the  forms,  the  judge  instructed  the  jury  with 
an example.  He told the jury that it should mark “ ‘yes’ ” on 
the jury form if it “ ‘unanimously’ ” concluded that an aggra­
vating  circumstance  had  been  proved.  Id.,  at  378.  Oth­
erwise,  he  said,  “ ‘of  course  you  must  answer  no.’ ”  Ibid. 
(emphasis  deleted).  These  instructions,  together  with  the 
forms, told the jury to mark “yes” on Section II’s list of miti­
gating  factors  only  if  the  jury  unanimously  concluded  that 
the particular mitigating factor had been proved, and to con­
sider  in its  weighing analysis  in Section  III only  those miti­
gating  factors  marked  “yes”  in  Section  II.  Thus,  as  this 
Court  found,  the  jury  was  instructed  that  it  could  consider 
in  the  ultimate  weighing  of  the  aggravating  and  mitigating 
evidence only the mitigating factors that the jury had unani­
mously found to exist.  See id., at 380–381. 

The  instructions and  jury forms  in this  case differ  signiﬁ­
cantly  from  those  in  Mills.  The  trial  judge  instructed  the 
jury  that  the  aggravating  factors  it  would  consider  were 
the  speciﬁcations  that  the  jury  had  found  proved  beyond  a 
reasonable doubt at the guilt phase of the trial—essentially, 
that  each  murder  was  committed  in  a  course  of  conduct  in­
cluding  the  other  crimes,  and,  for  two  of  the  murders,  that 
the  murder  was  committed  with  the  intent  to  evade  appre­
hension or punishment for another offense.  8 Tr. 2967–2972 
(July 19, 1983). 

He  then  explained  the  concept  of  a  “mitigating  factor.” 
After  doing  so,  he  listed  examples,  including  that  “the  de­
fendant  because  of  a  mental  disease  or  defect  .  .  .  lacked 
substantial capacity to appreciate the criminality of his con­
duct  or  to  conform  his  conduct  to  the  requirements  of  the 
law.”  Id.,  at  2972–2973.  The  court  also  told  the  jury  that 
it could take account of “any other” mitigating consideration 
it  found  “relevant  to  the  issue  of  whether  the  defendant