Opinion ID: 2382857
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Should we Consider an Alternative Method of Analysis by Categories of Culpability Derived Solely from the Statutory Aggravating Factors?

Text: Before applying the system we must evaluate the alternatives that have been suggested to us. The State advocates matching cases by selecting those with the same configurations of statutory aggravating factors. The State points out that the advantage of such an approach is that it is objective and simpler. Relying solely on aggravating factors would, in the State's expert's view, give the Court a consistent definition of similar cases. In support of that position, the State relies on a report, prepared and submitted by its consultant, Herbert I. Weisberg, Ph.D., entitled Proportionality Review of Death Sentences in New Jersey: An Independent Analysis of Data on Capital Charging and Sentencing (Nov. 26, 1991) (the Weisberg Report ). At the request of the New Jersey Attorney General's Office, Dr. Weisberg conducted an independent analysis of available data on the administration of the death penalty. Although he pointed out a list of apparent errors discovered by staff of the Attorney General, his report relied primarily on the AOC data base, supplemented by limited information provided by the Attorney General. 1. Dr. Weisberg began his analysis by questioning what he regarded as an inconsistent use of data by the Master, derived from cases decided under legal interpretations that were later held to be incorrect. In some instances, he asserts, the Master found such sentences to be a valuable source of information; in others (including the geographic analysis) the Master excluded cases that are not death eligible under current law. Weisberg Report, supra, at 9-10. In addition, Dr. Weisberg questioned the Master's method of determining death eligibility by a set of aggravating and mitigating factors that are objectively present in a case, while limiting his evaluation in penalty trials to factors actually found by the penalty-phase decisionmaker. Dr. Weisberg questioned further the Master's treatment of the jury decision as a simple dichotomy  death versus life. He believed that the analysis failed to distinguish between a unanimous life-sentence verdict and a hung jury. In Dr. Weisberg's view, a deadlock falls somewhere between a unanimous life sentence and a unanimous death sentence as an indicator of culpability. He attempted, then, to analyze jury deadlocks on the weighing of aggravating and mitigating factors. Id. at 11. Hence, he attempted to separate cleanly the prosecutorial component from the jury component and to identify the relevant data and cases for each. For prosecutorial-charging decisions, he would examine only whether a notice of factors had been served, regardless of any subsequent guilt-trial decision. Finally, he challenged what he called the highly elaborate statistical manipulations involved in the `logistic regression' models. Id. at 13. In his view, the models included far too many potentially predictive independent variables that might distort the association, and errors associated with predictions would thus increase. Ibid. In Dr. Weisberg's view, to accept and work within what he calls existing realities is preferable. He does not regard the goal of estimating future death-sentencing frequencies as feasible. He envisions a more modest role for quantitative analysis of past decisions. In his view, [s]tatistical analysis is potentially capable of providing the Court with valuable insight into the main factors that influence prosecutors and juries. Such general information can serve as a useful backdrop against which particular circumstances of a case can be arrayed and evaluated. Id. at 15. 2. We shall try to illustrate Dr. Weisberg's method in terms of our concept of the electronic-index cards. As we understand it, Dr. Weisberg recommends the use of a universe of penalty trials in which at least one aggravating factor was found. He examined the outcomes for each possible combination of aggravating factors found and also for every combination of factors served by the prosecutor. He focused primarily on the aggravating factors found at the penalty trial. Ibid. In other words, Dr. Weisberg sorted the electronic-index cards on the basis of the aggravating factors actually found at penalty trials. He found twenty-one distinct combinations of factors appearing among the 108 cases in which at least one factor was found. Ibid. He attempted to group cases on the basis of the proportion of death sentences and deadlocks. Dr. Weisberg reported that cases involving factors c(4)(a) (prior murder), c(4)(d) (hired gun), and c(4)(h) (cop-killer) always resulted in at least a deadlock, as did cases involving a combination of c(4)(c) (torture/depravity), c(4)(f) (escaping detection), and c(4)(g) (in commission of felony). Ibid. Conversely, cases involving only one or more factors, c(4)(b) (grave risk to another), c(4)(f) (escaping detection), and c(4)(g) (in commission of felony) received mostly life-sentence verdicts, with the exception of those involving both factors c(4)(f) and c(4)(g). He reported further that there was only one death sentence among those cases. Ibid. His index-card sorting indicated to him that cases fall into a rough hierarchy in terms of deathworthiness. Here we use his style of referring to the factors in capital letters. Category I: Any of factors A, D, E, H or CFG combination Category II: None of above, but CF or CG combinations Category III: None of above, but C or FG Category IV: None of above, but (B, F, G, BF, or BG) Dr. Weisberg declined to incorporate analysis of mitigating factors because of the multiplicity of combinations and the uncertainty of the relationship with outcomes. He concluded that further sorting was made complex by the fact that mitigating factors need not be found unanimously, and especially without data on the number of jurors who actually voted for the factor. Id. at 16. Dr. Weisberg thus sorted the cases into four culpability categories. Category I, the highest culpability category, included those cases always resulting in at least a deadlock. He placed every configuration of aggravating factors [3] with a deadlock or death-sentencing frequency of 1.0 in Category I ( i.e., any of the factors A, D, E, H, and CFG combinations). Id. at 15-16. Weisberg made two exceptions. Finding that the three E cases (contract killer) were similar to D cases already in Category I, Weisberg added those cases to Category I. Id. at 15. Weisberg also placed the CF combination in Category II. Weisberg next sorted the cases into Category IV, the lowest culpability category. Category IV cases included those aggravating-factor combinations with a zero death-sentencing frequency. Weisberg found that cases involving only one or more of factors B, F, and G received mostly life sentences, with the exception of FG combinations. Id. at 15-16. Weisberg sorted the remaining cases at the fifty-percent mark. That is, when the majority of cases with certain combinations of aggravating factors resulted in death, Dr. Weisberg classified them as Category II cases. If the majority of cases received life sentences, Weisberg placed them in Category III. Id. at 15. The results of that three-outcome, four-level approach are presented in Table 9 of the Weisberg Report, reprinted below. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Death | Life | Deadlock | |----------------------------|--------------|--------------|--------------| | I: A, D, E, H or CFG comb. | 0.72 (18/25) | 0.08 (2/25) | 0.20 (5/25) | |----------------------------|--------------|--------------|--------------| | II: CF or CG comb. | 0.56 (10/18) | 0.28 (5/18) | 0.17 (3/18) | |----------------------------|--------------|--------------|--------------| | III: C or FG comb. | 0.21 (6/29) | 0.48 (14/29) | 0.31 (9/29) | |----------------------------|--------------|--------------|--------------| | IV: B, F, G, BF or | 0.03 (1/36) | 0.72 (26/36) | 0.25 (9/36) | | BG comb. | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------- If the Court were to adopt a system of case categorization similar to that developed in Dr. Weisberg's research, then all penalty-trial cases in the same category would form a class of roughly similar cases. The proportion of cases in this category that resulted in a death sentence would provide useful insight, as would also the proportion of hung juries. However, this quantitative data would represent only a starting point. Detailed qualitative comparisons among the cases within the category would be necessary to refine the Court's culpability assessment. The Special Master's vision of a more mechanized approach to proportionality review is seductive. However, the attempt to push statistical analysis beyond a more limited role may simply open the door to methodological controversy that will ultimately frustrate and confuse the Court. [ Weisberg Report, supra, at 38-39.] The defense characterizes Weisberg's approach as inconsistent and incomplete. In general, the defense notes that because the model is based solely on aggravating factors, the character of the defendant is ignored. In addition, Weisberg's approach does not remedy the alleged flaws in Baldus's study, specifically, the small sample size, which reduces the confidence one has in the conclusions and the factual dissimilarity between the cases in the culpability categories. The Public Defender makes several specific challenges to Weisberg's approach. He charges that Weisberg does not treat deadlock cases consistently. In creating Category I, Weisberg equates a deadlock with a death sentence; however, he equates the deadlock with life sentences in forming the other culpability categories. Defendant claims that treating deadlock cases the same as a death sentence is insupportable. Important to proportionality review is the outcome of the jury's decision. Deadlocked cases cannot be properly characterized as reflecting deathworthiness judgments. The Public Defender raises a variety of other concerns related to the model's statistical consistency. Most importantly, that after establishing numerical rules for Category I, which place factor c(4)(d) (killed for money) cases in Category I, Weisberg deems factor c(4)(e) (hired a killer) cases similar, because both involve contract killings. The Public Defender claims that that manipulation was designed to place Marshall, the sole E case to receive a death sentence, in the highest culpability category. In fact, the three E cases have a frequency rating of .33, which would place Marshall in culpability Category III, not I. Dr. Weisberg was candid to recognize that he felt least certain about the assignment of Marshall's E case to Category I because of the paucity of available data. Weisberg Report, supra, at 15. Obviously, any analytical method can be found to be subject to improvements. The exclusion of mitigating factors from the State's approach is especially problematic for us. Merely using the statutory aggravating factors skews the process because New Jersey's aggravating factors focus primarily on the crime. Only the c(4)(a) factor (prior murder conviction) relates to characteristics of the defendant. N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3e instructs the Court to assess similarity in terms of the crime and the defendant. Accordingly, the mitigating factors must be used because they focus on the defendant's characteristics. Ramseur, supra, 106 N.J. at 330, 524 A. 2d 188 (emphasizing that both components are important in identifying similar cases). The issue of treatment of mitigating factors arose during the preparation of the Final Report. Mitigating factors need not be found unanimously. State v. Bey, 112 N.J. 123, 159-61, 548 A. 2d 887 (1988) ( Bey II). If a mitigating factor received one or more votes, the Master coded the factor as being present in that case. Final Report, supra, at 13 n. 10. The State argues that statutory mitigating factors should be considered, but the actual vote should be recorded. The State's position reflects the concern that a case in which only two jurors found the c(5)(a) factor (emotional or mental disturbance) should be weighted differently from a case receiving ten votes on that factor. Because the number of jurors voting for each mitigating factor is not always available, Baldus's statistics indicate the average effect of the particular mitigating factor having been found or not found in the case. Ibid. Although the lack of complete information on mitigating factors is a concern, the State's approach creates a greater concern because it does not use any mitigating factors in defining a comparison group of cases. The greater overall measure of completeness in the Master's data base better serves the Court's need to assess disproportionality in terms of the crime and the defendant.