{
  "id": "RS21909",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "RS21909",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 102575,
      "date": "2004-08-12",
      "retrieved": "2016-04-07T20:10:29.484400",
      "title": "Capital Punishment: Summary of Supreme Court Decisions of the 2003-2004 Term",
      "summary": "In the 2003-2004 term, the Supreme Court decided in  Banks v. Dretke , that Delma\nBanks should be\nallowed to raise  Brady  challenges based on failure by the prosecution to release\nexculpatory evidence\nin federal  habeas  proceedings even though they had been fully presented to the state\ncourts. In\n Nelson v. Campbell,  it ruled that a challenge to the method of execution under 42 U.S.C.\nSection \n1983 is not equivalent to a  habeas corpus  petition, provided that the petitioner is not\ncontesting his\nimprisonment (the petitioner claimed that the Alabama prison's intended use of a \"cut-down\"\nprocedure to access his veins for a lethal injection violated his Eighth Amendment protection against\ncruel and unusual punishment) and that section (Section 1983) is appropriate for his Eighth\nAmendment claim seeking a temporary stay and permanent injunctive relief. In  Beard v.\nBanks,  the\nCourt held that the petitioner could not benefit from retroactive application of its 1988 decision in\n Mills v. Maryland  regarding consideration of less than unanimously-found mitigation. \nIn  Schriro\nv. Summerlin,  the Court decided against retroactive application of its 2002 decision in\n Ring v.\nArizona , regarding the right to have a jury find any fact necessary for imposition of the death\npenalty. \nIn  Tennard v. Dretke,  the Court held that the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit used\nan improper\nlegal standard when it refused to allow Tennard to appeal the district court's decision denying him\na writ of  habeas corpus  based on his failure to establish a nexus between his crime and\nevidence of\nhis low IQ. In  Mitchell v. Esparza , ( per curiam)  it concluded that the Ohio\nCourt of Appeals had\nproperly subjected the  habeas  petitioner's claims to harmless error, when, although the\nsole offender,\nhe argued he had not been charged with being the principal offender.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "American Law"
  ]
}