Court Opinion

ID: 9599875
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:22:01.641789+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:47.328073
License: Public Domain

*343FINNEY, Chief Justice:
I respectfully dissent and would grant petitioner a new sentencing hearing.
On direct appeal from his resentencing proceeding, petitioner contended the trial judge committed reversible error in denying petitioner’s request to charge the jury on the statutory mitigating circumstance that the murder was committed under the influence of mental or emotional disturbance. S.C.Code Ann. § 16 — 3—20(C)(b)(2) (Supp.1995). The majority of the Court affirmed the refusal to charge, holding, “There was no evidence at trial that, at the time of the murder, Jones was under the influence of a mental or emotional disturbance.” State v. Jones, 298 S.C. 118, 123, 378 S.E.2d 594, 597 (1989), cert. denied, 494 U.S. 1060, 110 S.Ct. 1534, 108 L.Ed.2d 773 (1990). I alone dissented, finding evidence in the record to support the requested charge. Id. at 126, 378 S.E.2d at 598 (Finney, A.J., dissenting). In light of the majority opinion in petitioner’s direct appeal, it is res judicata that there was no evidence presented at the resentencing proceeding that petitioner was suffering from any mental or emotional disturbance at the time he killed Mr. Plyler and assaulted Mrs. Plyler. State v. Gilbert, 277 S.C. 53, 283 S.E.2d 179 (1981) (subsequent history omitted) (issues decided in first appeal are res judicata in later proceedings).
In this post-conviction relief (PCR) proceeding, petitioner alleged resentencing counsel were ineffective in failing to present evidence of his mental and emotional state so as to entitle him to a charge on the “mental/emotional disturbance” mitigating circumstance. The PCR judge denied relief. Rather than review the actual issue before this Court today, the majority opinion restates the question, and concludes that the evidence presented at the PCR hearing regarding petitioner’s mental and emotional condition was merely cumulative to that presented at the original resentencing proceeding, and thus petitioner cannot meet his burden of demonstrating prejudice.
It appears that the Court today has recognized that my position in 1989 was correct, and that the evidence presented at the resentencing entitled petitioner to a mitigating charge. We were therefore in error in failing to reverse that resen*344tencing on direct appeal. In my view, it is patently unfair and disingenuous to use our 1989 error as the reason we must also deny petitioner relief in 1997. The procedural posture of this case is that no evidence was presented at the resentencing proceeding that petitioner suffered from any mental or emotional disturbance at the time he committed this crime. State v. Jones, supra. The new evidence presented at the PCR hearing, as documented by the majority opinion, clearly would have entitled petitioner to a mitigating charge on mental/emotional disturbance. Counsel’s failure to present this evidence was deficient.
The majority concludes petitioner failed to meet the prejudice prong of Strickland because “there is no reasonable probability the sentencer would have concluded the balance of aggravating and mitigating circumstances did not warrant death.” This standard is a specific application of the oft-cited general rule of Strickland that to establish prejudice the defendant must show there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different. 466 U.S. at 694, 104 S.Ct. 2052. This specific application of the rule is premised in Strickland on the United States Supreme Court’s repeated recognition in that case that a capital penalty proceeding under Florida law requires the sentencer to weigh aggravating and mitigating circumstances. See Fla.Stat. § 921.141 (1997) (advisory jury must make finding whether mitigating circumstances outweigh aggravating circumstances; sentencing judge must find mitigating circumstances do not outweigh aggravating to impose death).
As noted by the majority, South Carolina, unlike Florida, does not require a weighing of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. Although a finding of an aggravating circumstance is necessary to support a death sentence, life may be imposed irrespective of such a finding and even in the absence of any mitigating circumstances. See State v. Green, 301 S.C. 347, 392 S.E.2d 157 (1990); S.C.Code Ann. § 16-3-20 (Supp. 1997). The sentencer always retains the discretion to impose a life sentence. Consequently, this Court has repeatedly held the failure to submit to the sentencing jury a mitigating circumstance supported by the evidence is reversible error with no requirement that actual prejudice be shown. See *345State v. Young, 305 S.C. 380, 409 S.E.2d 352 (1991); State v. Caldwell, 300 S.C. 494, 388 S.E.2d 816 (1990); State v. Pierce, 289 S.C. 430, 346 S.E.2d 707 (1986).
Because South Carolina’s capital sentencing procedure is unlike Florida’s, the specific application in Strickland of the prejudice prong is not controlling here. We cannot determine prejudice by weighing the aggravating and mitigating circumstances since there is no objective standard by which to revisit the impact of aggravating and mitigating circumstances on the sentencer’s decision. In my opinion, this Court must look instead to Strickland’s general rule that prejudice is shown by demonstrating a reasonable probability that the result of the proceeding would have been different. “A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.” 466 U.S. at 694,104 S.Ct. 2052.1 .
Here, petitioner was sentenced to death without the benefit of having the trial judge submit to the jury a mitigating circumstance to which he was entitled, and which could have swayed the jury, or even one juror, to impose life despite the aggravating circumstances in this case. See § 16-3-20(C) (jury shall not recommend death unless unanimous). This defect in petitioner’s sentencing proceeding cannot help but undermine our confidence in the outcome. To conclude otherwise is to deny Strickland’s stated purpose — “to ensure a fair trial.” 466 U.S. at 686, 104 S.Ct. 2052. I would reverse and remand for a new sentencing proceeding.

. "[A] defendant need not show that counsel’s deficient conduct more likely than not altered the outcome in the case.” 466 U.S. at 693, 104 S.Ct. 2052.