Court Opinion

ID: 9778952
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:27:55.193931+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:16.455041
License: Public Domain

LAMBERT, Justice,
dissenting.
To reach the conclusion that Bullington v. Missouri, 451 U.S. 430, 101 S.Ct. 1852, 68 L.Ed.2d 270 (1981), does not control this *50case, the majority has found it necessary to analyze the constitutional foundations of that controlling decision and upon its view that the foundation decisions do not apply, the majority has determined that Bulling-ton itself is inapplicable. This is so despite its own conclusion that the Kentucky capital sentencing procedure and the Missouri capital sentencing procedure are virtually identical. “The only discemable and relevant difference between Kentucky’s capital sentencing procedure and the procedures of Missouri and Arizona, is that, under Kentucky’s procedure, the jury is not restricted to only two choices in the range of punishment that it may recommend.” Op. at 46. The distinction noted by the majority is without any meaningful difference.
In its Bullington decision the Supreme Court stated,
Chief Justice Bardgett, in his dissent from the ruling of the Missouri Supreme Court majority, observed that the sentence of life imprisonment which petitioner received at his first trial meant that “the jury has already acquitted the defendant of whatever was necessary to impose the death sentence.” 594 S.W.2d at 922. We agree.
Id., 451 U.S. at 445, 101 S.Ct. at 1861-62.
The Supreme Court of Kentucky should agree also, or at least yield gracefully, to the views of the final arbiter of Federal constitutional law. Eldred has already been tried; and the jury recommended and the court imposed a sentence of life without parole for twenty-five years. He should not have to face the death penalty a second time.
STEPHENS, C.J., and STUMBO, J., join this dissenting opinion.