Court Opinion

ID: 9488703
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:53:29.950771+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:03.434540
License: Public Domain

KRAVITCH, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment:
Reluctantly, I concur. I write specially because, in my view, had evidence of White’s organic brain damage and low I.Q. been properly presented to the jury as a mitigating circumstance at sentencing, there is a reasonable probability that the death penalty would not have been imposed, and therefore that failure of the trial attorney to present such evidence constituted ineffective assistance of counsel. As the majority points out, however, this claim was raised in the prior habeas petition, although not as thoroughly documented or persuasively argued as in the present petition. We are bound by Supreme Court rulings as to the standard for cause in successive petitions, and unfortunately petitioner has not overcome these procedural hurdles. As a result, a potentially meritorious claim that might have kept Jerry White from the electric chair will never be heard.