Entries tagged with “John Blume”
Policy Issues
Arbitrariness
,Intellectual Disability
,Juveniles
,United States Supreme Court
,Executions Overview
,Dec 17, 2021
“Right Too Soon” Study: One in Seven Prisoners Put to Death in U.S. Had Legal Issues that Make Their Executions Unconstitutional
At least one in seven death-row prisoners put to death in the United States since executions resumed in 1977 had legal claims in their cases that would render their executions unconstitutional, a new Cornell University Law School study…
Policy Issues
Intellectual Disability
,United States Supreme Court
,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…
Policy Issues
Arbitrariness
,Race
,Apr 14, 2023
LAW REVIEWS — Collection of Articles on the Death Penalty from Leading Scholars
The following law review articles by several key death penalty researchers were recently published in 107 Cornell Law Review, No. 6, September, 2022. They cover a variety of issues, such as the interplay between race and capital punishment, the history of the death penalty, the federal death penalty, sentencing trends, and the federal court’s role in capital…
Executions
Methods of Execution
,Feb 06, 2024
South Carolina Supreme Court Hears Arguments on Constitutionality of Electrocution and Firing Squad, Considers Scope of Secrecy Law
On February 6, 2024, the South Carolina Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Owens v. Stirling, a case in which death-sentenced prisoners challenged the state’s electrocution and firing squad execution methods as unconstitutional. A South Carolina trial court had previously held an extensive evidentiary hearing and issued an injunction against use of those methods based on the state’s constitutional prohibition against “cruel,” “unusual,” or “corporal” punishments. For almost 90 minutes the…