Opinion ID: 1128377
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: sentencing instruction 2-a impermissibly limited the jury's consideration of mitigation.

Text: ¶ 75. Crawford argues that the jury was reasonably likely to interpret its instructions as a requirement that it make a finding as a unanimous jury, not as individual jurors, before considering a mitigating factor in any way in the sentencing process. He contends that the language of Instruction 2-A could have misled the jury to believe that a finding of mitigating circumstances must be unanimous. The United States Supreme Court in McKoy v. North Carolina, 494 U.S. 433, 110 S.Ct. 1227, 108 L.Ed.2d 369 (1990), found that a jury instruction which requires the jury to unanimously find mitigating circumstances in the balancing process impermissibly limits jurors' consideration of mitigating evidence and violates the Eighth Amendment. Id. at 444, 110 S.Ct. at 1234. ¶ 76. This specific question has been resolved by this Court on several occasions, most recently in Davis v. State: Davis complains that the jury was never instructed that mitigating circumstances were to be found individually and not unanimously prior to being considered in the weighing process. In summary, Davis argues that because findings of aggravating circumstances had to be unanimous, reasonable jurors may have reached a like conclusion concerning the finding of mitigating circumstances. Davis relies upon McKoy v. North Carolina, 494 U.S. 433, 110 S.Ct. 1227, 108 L.Ed.2d 369 (1990); Mills v. Maryland, 486 U.S. 367, 108 S.Ct. 1860, 100 L.Ed.2d 384 (1988); and State v. McNeil, 327 N.C. 388, 395 S.E.2d 106 (1990), cert. denied, North Carolina v. McNeil, 499 U.S. 942, 111 S.Ct. 1403, 113 L.Ed.2d 459 (1991)(holding that oral instructions which require a jury to find mitigating circumstances unanimously to be reversible error). Other courts have extended the holdings of McKoy and Mills to reverse death sentences where the jury was not told explicitly that mitigating circumstances are to be found and weighed by individual jurors. However, this Court in Hansen v. State, 592 So.2d 114, 149-50 (Miss. 1991), declined to extend these holdings. Where the instruction does not use the words unanimously nor unanimous in the mitigating circumstances portion of the jury instructions but instead is found only in the aggravating circumstances portion, we have held that the instruction does not offend the holding in Mills. Id. This Court has previously rejected this argument. See, e.g., Ladner v. State, 584 So.2d 743, 760 (Miss. 1991); Willie v. State, 585 So.2d 660, 681 (Miss. 1991); Turner v. State, 573 So.2d 657, 668 (Miss. 1990); and Shell v. State, 554 So.2d 887 (Miss. 1989), reversing on other grounds, 498 U.S. 1, 111 S.Ct. 313, 112 L.Ed.2d 1 (1990). Davis, 684 So.2d at 664-65. Because Crawford's argument parallels that considered and rejected by this Court in Davis, we will treat Crawford's argument similarly. Accordingly, this assignment of error is without merit.