Source: https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/united-states-supreme-court-decisions-2003-2004-term
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 18:46:41+00:00

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The Court ruled on an appeal by the State of Pennsylvania stemming from a federal court ruling that invalidated the death sentence of George Banks, who was on death row for a multiple murder committed in 1982. Banks' sentence had been overturned on the grounds that the jury instruction during sentencing violated a 1988 Supreme Court ruling that held that jurors did not have to agree unanimously on the existence of mitigating circumstances when determining the appropriate sentence.
At issue in this appeal was whether or not the 1988 decision could be applied retroactively, as the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit so held. In addition to this case, about 30 Pennsylvania death sentences were at stake for similar concerns. Because the Supreme Court has previously decided that "new rules" generally cannot be applied retroactively in federal habeas proceedings, the issue in Banks was whether the decision in Mills v. Maryland was a "new rule" or an application of an old rule.
Justice Stevens, writing for the dissenting justices, found nothing novel about the Mills rule and stated , "the kind of arbitrariness that would enable 1 vote in favor of death to outweigh 11 in favor of forbearance would violate the bedrock fairness principles that have governed our trial proceedings for centuries. Rejecting such a manifestly unfair procedural innovation does not announce a "new rule" ... but simply affirms that our fairness principles do not permit blatant exceptions."
In a 5-4 decision on June 24, 2004, the Supreme Court determined that its 2002 decision in Ring v. Arizona (No. 01-488) was not retroactive, thereby denying new sentencing hearings for dozens of death row inmates in Arizona, Idaho, Montana and Nebraska whose sentences were originally handed down by judges, but whose cases are older and not in the first stages of their appeals. In Ring, the Court decided that sentencing laws must protect the right to a jury determination of eligibility for the death penalty. With their decision in Summerlin, the Justices decided that their original 7-2 decision in Ring was a procedural rule and thus was not retroactive. Dissenting in Summerlin were Justices Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer. Discussing the differences between the death row inmates granted new sentencing hearings and the death row inmates denied new sentencing hearings because they are in a later stage of appeals, Justice Breyer stated: "Certainly the ordinary citizen will not understand the difference. That citizen will simply witness two individuals, both sentenced through the use of unconstitutional procedures, one individual going to his death, the other saved, all through an accident of timing. How can the Court square this spectacle with what it has called the 'vital importance to the defendant and to the community that any decision to impose the death sentence be, and appear to be, based on reason'?"
Did the Ninth Circuit err by holding that the new rule announced in Ring is substantive, rather than procedural, and therefore exempt from the retroactivity analysis of Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989) (plurality)?
Did the Ninth Circuit err by holding that the new rule announced in Ring applies retroactively to cases on collateral review under Teague's exception for watershed rules of criminal procedure that alter bedrock procedural principles and seriously enhance the accuracy of the proceedings?
Click Here to read the Respondent's Brief (PDF) in this case, filed February 26, 2004.
The petition for a writ of certiorari was granted limited to the following question: Whether a complaint brought under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 by a death-sentenced state prisoner, who seeks to stay his execution in order to pursue a challenge to the procedures for carrying out the execution, is properly recharacterized as a habeas corpus petition under 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2254?
UPDATE: Nelson died of natural causes on Alabama's death row on Nov. 2, 2009.
On February 24, 2004, the United States Supreme Court overturned the death sentence of Delma Banks, Jr. by a 7-2 vote, concluding that Banks was denied a fair trial as prosecutors did not disclose key information to the defense. The case has been remanded to a lower court.
In an appeal from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, the U.S. Supreme Court had granted certiorari in this case of a Texas death row inmate who maintained that prosecutorial misconduct and ineffective defense counsel denied him a fair trial 23 years ago. The Court examined the complex history of Banks' appeals and a lower court ruling that held that Banks could not show his attorney's performance affected the outcome of his 1980 trial. Banks' current attorneys assert that their client was poorly represented at trial, that prosecutors withheld key information, and that testimony from two prosecution witnesses was unreliable. (Associated Press, April 21, 2003).
On Wednesday, June 16, 2004 the Supreme Court denied Steven Oken's request for a stay and denied his petition for a writ of certiorari. The Court also granted the State of Maryland's motion to lift the stay granted by the U. S. District Court (Sizer, Comm'r, Maryland DOC v. Oken, No. 03A1023, June 16, 2004). Dissenting in the order to vacate the stay of execution were Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, and Stevens. Oken was executed by the State of Maryland on June 17, 2004.
This case involves the proper instructions for the jury when mental retardation or similar mitigating evidence is offered at a sentencing hearing. The question for the court was: "Did the Court of Appeals misapply Penry v. Johnson, 532 U.S. 782 (2001), by imposing a requirement that evidence demonstrate a 'uniquely severe permanent handicap' in order for a Texas capital murder defendant to claim that a 'nullification' instruction was improper?"
The Supreme Court denied certiorari for Nanon Williams, who was a juvenile (17-years-old) at the time of the crime.
(Update: Williams' death sentence was commuted in light of Roper v. Simmons (2005).

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