Opinion ID: 746888
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Beck Claim: Due Process, Lesser Included Offense Claim

Text: 40 In Cordova v. Lynaugh, 838 F.2d 764, 767 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 486 U.S. 1061, 108 S.Ct. 2832, 100 L.Ed.2d 932 (1988), this court held that the Eighth Amendment as made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment and the Due Process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment require that a jury in a capital case be allowed to consider convicting the defendant of a lesser included, noncapital offense if the jury could rationally acquit the defendant of the capital crime and convict the defendant of the noncapital crime. In Cordova, this court stated: 41 As explained in Hopper v. Evans, 456 U.S. 605, 610, 102 S.Ct. 2049, 2052, 72 L.Ed.2d 367 (1982), [Beck v. Alabama, 447 U.S. 625, 100 S.Ct. 2382, 65 L.Ed.2d 392 (1980) ] stands for the proposition that the jury [in a capital case] must be permitted to consider a verdict of guilt of noncapital offense 'in every case' in which 'the evidence would have supported such a verdict.'  Although Beck, strictly speaking, holds only that a state cannot impose a blanket ban on the giving of lesser-included-offense instructions in a capital case, Reddix v. Thigpen, 805 F.2d 506, 511 (5th Cir.1986), we have consistently held that Beck 's holding applies when the state trial court refuses a lesser included offense instruction. See Reddix, 805 F.2d at 511-12 (applying Beck but finding no violation because evidence did not support lesser included offense); Bell v. Watkins, 692 F.2d 999, 1004-05 (5th Cir.1982), cert. denied, 464 U.S. 843, 104 S.Ct. 142, 78 L.Ed.2d 134 (1983)(same). 2