Anti-Murder He Wrote: Is the Death Penalty Unconstitutional?
- Tree of Knowledge Research
- Jul 17, 2014
- 3 min read
Although more than 30 years have passed since the United States Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty, the topic still sparks heated debates. On Wednesday, July 16, 2014, a California federal judge ruled the death penalty unconstitutional. The U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney’s decision represents a legal victory for those who want to abolish the death penalty in California. In his 29-page Opinion, Carney critiqued the death penalty, holding that uncertainties and unpredictable delays over executions violate the Eight Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. [1] He noted that death penalty appeals can last decades and as a result most condemned inmates are likely to die of natural causes before their executions are carried out. [2]
Since 1978, more than 900 people in the state have been sentenced to death row; however, of those people, only 13 have been executed and 94 have died of other causes. [3] Carney reported that approximately 40% have been on death row longer than 19 years – these occasional executions have created an arbitrary and irrational system that serves no legitimate purpose. [4] “As for the random few for whom execution does become a reality, they will have languished for so long on Death Row that their execution will serve no retributive or deterrent purpose and will be arbitrary,” the judge stated. [5] Part of the problem "is the decade-long inability (or perhaps unwillingness) of California state officials to come up with an execution protocol, effectively putting the state’s death chamber out of commission.“ [6]
The District Court Judge’s decision overturned the death sentence of Ernest Jones, a man sentenced to death in 1995 for the rape and murder of his girlfriend’s mother. [7] The judge also noted 285 of the people on death row have been there longer than Jones. [4] This decision is limited to this single case and has no immediate impact on executions statewide; however, if upheld on appeal, the decision would end California capital punishment system that has been approved by votes three times – in 1972, 1978, and 2012, when an initiative to abolish the death penalty lost by four percentage points. Read Judge Carney’s Order in Jones v. Chappell.
Adding fuel to death penalty critic’s fire, shortly after the Jones decision, an Arizona State execution went seemingly wrong. On July 23, the execution process of convicted murderer, Joseph Wood, took two hours amid reports of labored gasping and snorting that some took as evidence that the execution was cruel and unusual. Aside from the execution process itself, Woods endured close to 20 years of anguished death contemplation. The State of Arizona sentenced Wood in 1989 for fatally shooting his estranged girlfriend and her father; however, the Arizona Supreme Court court did not affirm Wood’s conviction and sentence for over another decade. [8] In addition, before the execution, Wood had fought, without success, for specific information about the drugs to be used in his execution, contending that the state’s failure to provide that information violated his First Amendment rights. [9] The Ninth Circuit agreed, preliminarily enjoining the state of Arizona from proceeding with the execution and, over the dissent of eleven judges, the Ninth Circuit denied rehearing en banc. The Supreme Court, however, vacated the Ninth Circuit panel ruling, without recorded dissent, thereby confirming the scheduled execution. Ninth Circuit Court chief justice, Alex Kozinski issued an evocation on the death penalty in his dissenting opinion to Wood v. Ryan, claiming executions are “brutal, savage events, and nothing the state tries to do can mask that reality.” [10] Kozinski argues that if the governments wish to carry out the death penalty, they must “return to more primitive – and foolproof – methods of execution.” [11] Although the court has rejected “cruel and unusual punishment” challenges to legal injections, this latest execution could force the U.S. Supreme Court to revive the debate.
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[1] Jones v. Chappell, No. CV09-02158-CJC (C.D. Cal. 07/16/14).
[2] Id.
[3] Id.
[4] Id.
[5] Id.
[2] Wood v. Ryan, No. 14-16310 (9th Cir. 07/19/2014) (Chief Judge Alex Kozinski dissenting)
[3] Jones v. Chappell, No. CV09-02158-CJC (C.D. Cal. 07/16/14).
[4] Id.
[5] Wood v. Ryan, 693 F.3d 1104 (9th Cir. 2012).
[6] Wood v. Ryan, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, Case No. 14-16380; 2014 U.S. App. LEXIS 13867 (9th Cir. Ariz. July 19, 2014)
[7] Wood v. Ryan, No. 14-16310 (9th Cir. 07/19/2014) (Justice Alex Kozinski dissenting)
[8] State v. Wood, 881 P.2d 1158, 1177 (Ariz. 1994); Wood v. Arizona, 515 U.S. 1147 (1995); Wood v. Ryan, 693 F.3d 1104, 1122 (9th Cir. 2012); id.
[9] Wood v. Ryan, No. 14-16310 (9th Cir. 07/19/2014) (Justice Alex Kozinski dissenting)
[10] Id.
[11] Id.
