{
  "id": "RL31494",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "RL31494",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 101315,
      "date": "2002-07-08",
      "retrieved": "2016-05-24T20:07:17.266941",
      "title": "Capital Punishment: Summary of Supreme Court Decisions of the 2001-02 Term",
      "summary": "The Supreme Court took six significant actions with respect to capital punishment during the\n2001-02 Term. In  Atkins v. Virginia,  which many consider the most significant case\nof the term, the Court\ndecided on June 20, 2002, that executing the mentally retarded violates the Eighth Amendment ban\non \"cruel and unusual punishment.\" Three cases involved issues concerning the constitutional\nstandards for effective- assistance- of- counsel in death penalty cases. On March 27, 2002, in\n Mickens v. Taylor , the Court addressed \"what a defendant must show in order to\ndemonstrate a Sixth\nAmendment violation where the trial court fails to inquire into a potential conflict of interest about\nwhich it knew or reasonably should have known.\" The majority held that a defendant in such\ncircumstances must meet the test of  Cuyler v. Sullivan  which requires showing an actual\nconflict of\ninterest which adversely affected his representation. On May 28, 2002, the Court in  Bell v.\nCone, \nvoted 8-1 to uphold the death sentence of a Tennessee man whose lawyer presented no mitigation\ncase in the penalty phase and offered no closing argument in response to the prosecution's request\nfor death. The majority held that there was not an \"entire\" failure by counsel. This case is\nnoteworthy because of its relationship to another performance case where the attorney for the defense\nin  Cockrell v. Burdine,  dozed off as many as 10 times during the trial, for as long as 10\nminutes. The\nCourt refused to reinstate the death sentence by denying  certiorari.  By declining to\nintervene in a\ncase that focused national attention on the quality of legal representation for death penalty\ndefendants, the Court's action did not establish a precedent that would apply to capital cases where\nthere continue to be concerns regarding chronic complaints of inadequate and ineffective-assistance-\nof-counsel. While the Court may have found a sleeping lawyer troubling, it declined to reconsider\nthe larger issue in  Cockrell : what constitutes ineffective-assistance-of-counsel in death\npenalty cases. \nOn June 24, 2002, in  Ring v. Arizona,  the Court decided in the often criticized practice\nof having a\njudge, rather than a jury, decide the critical sentencing issues in a death penalty case that a judge\ncould not make findings that would increase a defendant's sentence to the maximum, since that was\ncomparable to an additional conviction. This decision should be submitted to a jury and would\nrequire proof beyond a reasonable doubt in order to justify the death penalty. Finally, on June 28,\n2002, the Court in  United States v. Bass  ruled against a black defendant's effort to seek\ndiscovery\nregarding his claim that blacks were charged with capital offenses more than others. The Court ruled\nthat he failed to present evidence that similarly situated persons were treated differently.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "American Law",
    "Constitutional Questions"
  ]
}