Capital cas­es are on hold in Florida and Delaware as their state courts con­sid­er the impact of the recent U.S. Supreme Court rul­ing in Hurst v. Florida. The Hurst deci­sion ruled that Florida’s sen­tenc­ing pro­ce­dure was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al because a judge, rather than a jury, deter­mined the aggra­vat­ing fac­tors that made a case eli­gi­ble for a death sen­tence. The Florida Supreme Court has already delayed one Florida exe­cu­tion to decide whether, and to what extent, the rul­ing should be applied retroac­tive­ly. It’s deci­sion is expect­ed to affect the cas­es of more than 300 pris­on­ers on Florida’s death row. At the same time, in the absence of a law­ful mech­a­nism to con­duct cap­i­tal tri­als, Florida tri­al judges are delay­ing new tri­als or remov­ing the death penal­ty from the case. In Delaware, one of only two states besides Florida that does­n’t require a unan­i­mous jury to impose a death sen­tence, Superior Court Judge Paul Wallace has asked the Delaware Supreme Court to rule on whether Hurst affects death penal­ty cas­es in that state. In request­ing review by the Supreme Court, Wallace cau­tioned that ​“Delaware’s cap­i­tal cas­es must pro­ceed only under sen­tenc­ing pro­ce­dures that com­port with fed­er­al and state con­sti­tu­tion­al require­ments for the deter­mi­na­tion of a poten­tial sen­tence of death.” More than two dozen cap­i­tal tri­als — includ­ing four that are sched­uled to begin in the next sev­er­al months — could be put on hold if the Delaware Supreme Court agrees to take up the issue. The Florida Supreme Court stayed the February 11 exe­cu­tion of Cary Michael Lambrix while it decides how the deci­sion will affect those already on death row. Meanwhile, the Florida House Criminal Justice Committee approved a mea­sure to nar­row­ly address the prob­lems found in Hurst by requir­ing a unan­i­mous agree­ment of the jury on at least one aggra­vat­ing fac­tor while the Senate is con­sid­er­ing leg­is­la­tion to require unan­i­mous jury agree­ment on both aggra­vat­ing cirum­stances and the rec­om­men­da­tion of death. 

(S. Bousquet, ​“Florida Supreme Court blocks exe­cu­tion of death row inmate Michael Lambrix,” Tampa Bay Times, February 2, 2016; J. Burlew, ​“Florida’s death penal­ty in legal spot­light,” Tallahassee Democrat, February 1, 2016; J. Reyes and S. Spencer, ​“Delaware Supreme Court asked to weigh death penal­ty,” The News Journal, January 26, 2016; L. Morel & C. Wright, ​“Pinellas judge rejects death penal­ty request after Supreme Court rul­ing,” Tampa Bay Times, January 25, 2016.) See U.S. Supreme Court and Sentencing.

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