Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/14-7955_aplc.pdf
Page Number: 58

8 

GLOSSIP v. GROSS 

BREYER, J., dissenting 

Finally,  if  we  expand  our  definition  of  “exoneration” 
(which we limited to errors suggesting the defendant was 
actually  innocent)  and  thereby  also  categorize  as  “errone­
ous”  instances  in  which  courts  failed  to  follow  legally 
required  procedures,  the  numbers  soar.  Between  1973 
and 1995, courts identified prejudicial errors in 68% of the 
capital  cases  before  them.    Gelman,  Liebman,  West,  & 
Kiss, A Broken System: The Persistent Patterns of Rever­
sals of Death Sentences in the United States, 1 J. Empiri­
cal L. Studies 209, 217 (2004).  State courts on direct and 
postconviction  review  overturned  47%  of  the  sentences 
they  reviewed.    Id.,  at  232.  Federal  courts,  reviewing 
capital cases in habeas corpus proceedings, found error in
40% of those cases.  Ibid. 

This research and these figures are likely controversial.
Full briefing would allow us to scrutinize them with more 
care.  But, at a minimum, they suggest a serious problem 
of  reliability.    They  suggest  that  there  are  too  many  in­
stances  in  which  courts  sentence  defendants  to  death 
without  complying  with  the  necessary  procedures;  and 
they  suggest  that,  in  a  significant  number  of  cases,  the 
death sentence is imposed on a person who did not commit
the crime.  See Earley, A Pink Cadillac, An IQ of 63, and A 
Fourteen-Year-Old  from  South  Carolina:  Why  I  Can  No
Longer  Support  the  Death  Penalty,  49  U.  Rich.  L. Rev. 
811,  813  (2015)  (“I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
death  penalty  is  based  on  a  false  utopian  premise.    That 
false premise is that we have had, do have, will have 100% 
accuracy  in  death  penalty  convictions  and  executions”);
Earley,  I  Oversaw  36  Executions.  Even  Death  Penalty 
Supporters Can Push for Change, Guardian, May 12, 2014 
(Earley  presided  over  36  executions  as  Virginia  Attorney
General from 1998–2001); but see ante, at 2–3 (SCALIA, J., 
concurring)  (apparently  finding  no  special  constitutional 
problem  arising  from  the  fact  that  the  execution  of  an
innocent  person  is  irreversible).  Unlike  40  years  ago,  we