U.S. Supreme Court Reverses 3 Kansas Decisions Overturning Death Penalties

In an 8 – 1 deci­sion in Kansas v. Carr, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the deci­sions of the Kansas Supreme Court grant­i­ng new sen­tenc­ing hear­ings in three cap­i­tal cas­es, restor­ing the death sen­tences of Jonathan Carr, Reginald Carr, Jr., and Sidney Gleason pend­ing fur­ther appel­late review. The Kansas Supreme Court had vacat­ed the men’s death sen­tences because the jury had not been informed, as required by the Kansas Supreme Court, that mit­i­gat­ing fac­tors pre­sent­ed dur­ing the sen­tenc­ing pro­ceed­ing to spare a defen­dan­t’s life do not need to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. 

In his opin­ion for the Court, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote that such an instruc­tion was not con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly required. ​“Jurors,” he said, ​“will accord mer­cy if they deem it appro­pri­ate, and with­hold mer­cy if they do not.” He wrote that on the facts of these cas­es, there was lit­tle pos­si­bil­i­ty that the jury was con­fused about its role in find­ing and giv­ing effect to mitigating evidence. 

The Court also reject­ed an argu­ment that the Carr broth­ers should have had sep­a­rate sen­tenc­ing pro­ceed­ings, say­ing that even if any evi­dence against the broth­ers had been improp­er­ly admit­ted, it did not affect the fun­da­men­tal fair­ness of their penalty trial. 

The lone dis­senter in the case, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, wrote that the case should not have been reviewed, say­ing, ​“Kansas has not vio­lat­ed any fed­er­al con­sti­tu­tion­al right. If any­thing, the State has over­pro­tect­ed its cit­i­zens based on its inter­pre­ta­tion of state and fed­er­al law.” The deci­sion leaves open the pos­si­bil­i­ty that the Kansas courts could revis­it these issues under state law.