Alabama Executes Intellectually Disabled Death-Row Prisoner

Alabama has exe­cut­ed an intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled death-row pris­on­er who was sen­tenced to death by his tri­al judge despite a non-unan­i­mous sen­tenc­ing rec­om­men­da­tion by his jury. Willie B. Smith III was exe­cut­ed by three-drug lethal injec­tion on October 21, 2021 after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review his appeal of a low­er fed­er­al court rul­ing deny­ing his claim that the state’s choice to exe­cute him by lethal injec­tion vio­lat­ed his rights under the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Smith, who is African American, was sen­tenced to death in 1992 for the rob­bery and mur­der of a white woman whom he abduct­ed at an ATM machine. His vic­tim was the sis­ter of a police offi­cer. Two jurors vot­ed to spare his life, but Alabama law per­mit­ted the tri­al judge to dis­re­gard their votes and impose the death penal­ty. The state remains the sole juris­dic­tion that per­mits judges to impose the death penal­ty based upon a non-unan­i­mous jury vote for death.

In 2019, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit agreed that Smith was intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled under the accept­ed med­ical diag­nos­tic cri­te­ria for the dis­or­der and that Alabama’s denial of his claim that he was inel­i­gi­ble for the death penal­ty because of intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty would be con­sid­ered uncon­sti­tu­tion­al under sev­er­al U.S. Supreme Court deci­sions. Nevertheless, the cir­cuit court upheld Smith’s death sen­tence, say­ing the Supreme Court deci­sions had not been decid­ed at the time of Smith’s ini­tial appeal in the case. The U.S. Supreme Court in July 2020 declined to hear Smith’s appeal of that ruling.

In 2018, Alabama adopt­ed nitro­gen hypox­ia as an autho­rized method of exe­cu­tion and pro­vid­ed death-row pris­on­ers a 30-day win­dow to elect it, rather than lethal injec­tion, as the man­ner of their death. Smith alleged that because of his intel­lec­tu­al impair­ments, he was not able to time­ly des­ig­nate nitro­gen hypox­ia as the method of his exe­cu­tion. He argued that the Americans With Disabilities Act required Alabama to make rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tions for his dis­abil­i­ties and that Alabama could only exe­cute him by nitrogen hypoxia. 

On October 17, 2021, a fed­er­al dis­trict court judge denied Smith’s claim and late in the morn­ing on October 21, the Eleventh Circuit affirmed that rul­ing. In the ear­ly evening, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the issue, and Smith was exe­cut­ed. In a state­ment respect­ing the Court’s rul­ing, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote that the Court had no legal basis to stay the exe­cu­tion, but crit­i­cized Alabama’s con­duct: ​“Alabama does not dis­pute that Willie Smith has sig­nif­i­cant­ly below-aver­age intel­lec­tu­al func­tion­ing,” she wrote. ​“Although the State debates his pre­cise read­ing lev­el and IQ, those dis­putes do not resolve the fun­da­men­tal inequity: the State’s com­pressed time­line for noti­fy­ing eli­gi­ble inmates and hap­haz­ard approach to doing so. Once a State has deter­mined that indi­vid­u­als on death row should have a choice as to how the State will exe­cute them, it should ensure that a mean­ing­ful choice is provided.”

For back­ground on the issues in Mr. Smith’s case, see Intellectually Disabled Alabama Death-Row Prisoner Appeals Denial of Stay of Execution, Arguing Designation of Lethal Injection Violated Americans With Disabilities Act.