Professor Bruce Winick of the Miami School of Law has writ­ten an arti­cle argu­ing that the Supreme Court should extend the pro­tec­tion it present­ly offers to those with men­tal retar­da­tion and juve­niles to offend­ers with severe men­tal ill­ness, as well. In The Supreme Court’s Emerging Death Penalty Jurisprudence: Severe Mental Illness as the Next Frontier, Winick reviews the High Court’s analy­sis of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment under the Eighth Amendment with a focus on when the Court has found the death penal­ty dis­pro­por­tion­ate to the crime or for the offend­er. While Winick argues that the Supreme Court is not pre­pared to ren­der the death penal­ty itself as cru­el and unusu­al, he con­cludes that, ​“At least some (although by no means all) offend­ers suf­fer­ing from severe men­tal ill­ness, like those with men­tal retar­da­tion and juve­niles, will have suf­fi­cient­ly dimin­ished cul­pa­bil­i­ty and deter­abil­i­ty at the time of the offense to ren­der cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment a dis­pro­por­tion­ate penal­ty under the Eighth Amendment.” 

(B. Winick, ​“The Supreme Court’s Emerging Death Penalty Jurisprudence: Severe Mental Illness as the Next Frontier,” #2008 – 31, Social Science Research Network Electronic Paper Collection:
http://​ssrn​.com/​a​b​s​t​r​a​c​t​=​1​2​91781). See also Law Reviews and Mental Illness.

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