Opinion ID: 1697869
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Weight Assigned to Age as a Mitigating Factor

Text: In his final claim for postconviction relief, Morton contends that the trial court erred in summarily denying his claim that the United States Supreme Court's decision in Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005), this Court's decision in Urbin v. State, 714 So.2d 411 (Fla.1998), and newly discovered evidence call for the reweighing of his age as a mitigating factor. At the time of the murders, Morton was nineteen and a half years old and, as the record shows, possessed at least average intelligence. The trial court found the age mitigator applicable, but assigned it little weight. We have already rejected this claim both as procedurally barred when brought in postconviction proceedings, see Farina v. State, 937 So.2d 612, 626 n. 7 (Fla.2006), and on the merits where a defendant was at or above the age of eighteen at the time of the murder. See Kearse v. State, 969 So.2d 976, 992 (Fla. 2007) (denying Roper claim where defendant was eighteen years and three months old at the time of the crime and had mental and emotional impairments); see also Stephens v. State, 975 So.2d 405, 427 (Fla.2007); Hill v. State, 921 So.2d 579, 584 (Fla.2006). Similarly, Roper has no application here where the facts are undisputed that Morton's chronological age was above nineteen at the time he committed the crimes. Because it is impossible for Morton to demonstrate that he falls within the ages of exemption, his claim is facially insufficient and it was proper for the court to deny Morton a hearing on this claim. Morton also asserts that the trial court erred in denying his claim that newly discovered evidence from a 2004 brain mapping study, which establishes that sections of the human brain are not fully developed until age twenty-five, warrants a reweighing of his age as a mitigating factor. We have previously rejected recognizing new research studies as newly discovered evidence if based on previously available data. See Schwab, 969 So.2d at 325 (citing Diaz v. State, 945 So.2d 1136, 1144 (Fla.2006) (concluding doctor's letter addressing lethal injection research was not newly discovered evidence because conclusions in letter were based on old data)). Although this 2004 brain mapping study had not yet been published at the time of Morton's trials, Morton or his counsel could have discovered similar research at that time that stated that the human brain was not fully developed until early adulthood. See Jay D. Aronson, Brain Imaging, Culpability and the Juvenile Death Penalty, 13 Psychol. Pub. Pol'y & L. 115, 120 (2007) (In the past few decades ... neuroscientists have discovered that two key developmental processes, myelination ... and pruning of neural connections, continue to take place during adolescence and well into adulthood.... [B]rain regions responsible for basic life processes and sensory perception tend to mature fastest, whereas the regions responsible for behavioral inhibition and control, risk assessment, decision making, and emotion maturing take longer (Yakovlev & Lecours, 1967).). Therefore, the 2004 study would not constitute newly discovered evidence and the trial court correctly denied this claim without an evidentiary hearing.