Entries tagged with “Atkins v. Virginia”

Issues

Aug 02, 2024

Disability Pride Month Series: How Mitigation Specialists Help Protect Intellectually Disabled Defendants

In hon­or of Disability Pride Month (July), the Death Penalty Information Center post­ed a week­ly fea­ture high­light­ing issues relat­ed to the death penal­ty and dis­abil­i­ty and pro­files of indi­vid­u­als who have played key roles in chang­ing the laws to pro­tect pris­on­ers with dis­abil­i­ties. This final post focus­es on the role of mitigation…

Issues

Jul 15, 2024

Disability Pride Month Series: ​“National Treasure” Professor James W. Ellis

This July, in hon­or of Disability Pride Month, the Death Penalty Information Center is post­ing a week­ly fea­ture high­light­ing issues relat­ed to the death penal­ty and dis­abil­i­ty and pro­files of indi­vid­u­als who have played key roles in chang­ing the laws to pro­tect prisoners with…

Issues

Apr 01, 2024

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Removes Henderson County Man from Death Row Citing Intellectual Disability

On March 27, 2024, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) resen­tenced death row pris­on­er Randall Mays to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole after an expert for the state con­ced­ed that the evi­dence pre­sent­ed by Mr. Mays’ attor­neys indi­cates he is intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled, and thus inel­i­gi­ble for the death penal­ty. Originally sen­tenced to death in 2008 for the mur­der of two Henderson County, Texas, sheriff’s deputies, Mr. Mays’ attor­neys have long argued that he should be…

Issues

Nov 15, 2023

Randomness and Prosecutorial Misconduct in Death Penalty Cases Highlighted in South Carolina

A recent arti­cle in the Post and Courier details research into the rea­sons why 18 death sen­tences have been over­turned in South Carolina, find­ing one of the main rea­sons to be pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct. Research found that 11 of the 18 pris­on­ers received new sen­tences because of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct, while the oth­er sev­en received new sen­tences after the deci­sion in Atkins v. Virginia because they had intellectual…

Issues

Mar 02, 2023

MENTAL ILLNESS: Excluding Those with Severe Mental Illness from the Death Penalty — A Menu of Legislative Options

In a forth­com­ing arti­cle in the Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice regard­ing lim­i­ta­tions on the death penal­ty for those with dimin­ished respon­si­bil­i­ty, Richard Bonnie sum­ma­rizes the rea­sons why an exclu­sion for severe men­tal ill­ness in cap­i­tal cas­es is need­ed and exam­ines key draft­ing issues that can be expect­ed to arise in state…

Issues

Oct 07, 2022

Atkins at 20: Assessing the Purported Ban on Executing Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities

In its land­mark deci­sion in Atkins v. Virginia in 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that the use of the death penal­ty against indi­vid­u­als with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty con­sti­tut­ed cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment in vio­la­tion of the Eighth Amendment. Twenty years lat­er, how­ev­er, ​“there is not just the risk, but the cer­tain­ty” that states con­tin­ue to sen­tence intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled defen­dants to death, three legal schol­ars argue, and the fed­er­al courts are letting…

Issues

Feb 16, 2018

Is Racially Biased Testimony Wrongly Subjecting Intellectually Disabled Defendants to the Death Penalty?

The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2002 deci­sion in Atkins v. Virginia cat­e­gor­i­cal­ly bars states from exe­cut­ing any per­son who has Intellectual Disability. (Daryl Atkins is pic­tured.) However, as report­ed in recent sto­ries in Pacific Standard Magazine and the news­pa­per, The Atlanta Black Star, some states have attempt­ed to cir­cum­vent the Atkins rul­ing by using social stereo­types and race as grounds to argue that defen­dants of col­or are not intellectually…