Court Opinion

ID: 9545595
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:16:00.097736+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:15:09.194189
License: Public Domain

PARKS, Presiding Judge,
Specially Concurring:
The Oklahoma Legislature’s enactment of the “especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel” aggravating circumstance, as presently written, fails to “channel the sentencer’s discretion by ‘clear and objective standards’ that provide ‘specific and detailed guidance,’ and that ‘make rationally reviewable the process for imposing a sentence of death.’ ” Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420, 428, 100 S.Ct. 1759, 1764-65, 64 L.Ed.2d 398 (1980) (footnotes omitted). I am convinced that this aggravating circumstance is unconstitutionally vague both on its face and as applied. See Mello, Florida’s “Heinous, Atrocious or Cruel” Aggravating Circumstance: Narrowing the Class of Death-Eligible Cases Without Making It Smaller, 13 Stetson L.Rev. 523, 524 (1984) (it is ultimately impossible to apply this aggravating circumstance because all first degree murders are especially heinous, atrocious or cruel); Adamson v. Ricketts, 865 F.2d 1011, 1030-1039 (9th Cir.1988) (in striking down Arizona’s especially heinous, cruel, or depraved aggravating circumstance because the Arizona Supreme Court had been unable to arrive at an objective standard that could be uniformly applied, it was held that post hoc appellate rationalizations for death sentences cannot save improperly channeled determinations by a sentencer). Cf. Note, Maynard v. Cartwright: How the Supreme Court Killed the Catchall Category in the Oklahoma Death Penalty, 24 Tulsa L.J. 215-237 (1988). As a matter of stare decisis, however, I yield to the “torture or serious physical abuse” standard adopted in Stouffer, 742 P.2d at 563.