Court Opinion

ID: 9563540
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 18:41:20.391849+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:17:54.108077
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Justice,
concurring and •concurring in the result.
I concur in all of the Court’s opinion, except I concur in the result of part IX (The Death Penalty Statutes Were Not Unconstitutionally Applied to Wood) because I respectfully disagree with the Court’s decision concerning the application of the aggravating factor contained in I.C. § 19-2515(g)(6).
In State v. Fain, 116 Idaho 82, 774 P.2d 252 (1989), the Court characterized this “utter disregard” factor as referring “not to the outrageousness of the acts constituting the murder, but to the defendant’s lack of conscientious scruples against killing another human being.” Id. at 99, 774 P.2d at 269. I cannot agree that the unbelievably despicable conduct of the defendant in this case in mutilating his victim’s body seven days after the murder may be considered as conduct coming within this characterization. I am concerned that the Court’s expansion of the scope given to this aggravating factor will undermine the carefully crafted meaning of this subsection upon which the Court has upheld its constitutionality. This does not, however, affect the application of the aggravating factor contained in I.C. § 19-2515(g)(7) as a basis for imposing the death penalty. Therefore, I concur in the Court’s decision affirming the imposition of the death penalty.