Scalia focuses on murder details during arguments in Kansas cases, notes Breyer's capital views
During oral arguments on Wednesday, Justice Antonin Scalia focused on the details of a heinous murder and noted a colleague’s views questioning the constitutionality of capital punishment.
Justices were considering two issues during oral arguments in the sentencing of brothers Reginald and Jonathan Carr, report the Washington Post, the New York Times, SCOTUSblog and the Topeka Capital-Journal.
One issue is whether the brothers should have had separate sentencing hearings. The other is whether jurors should have been informed that factors mitigating against the death penalty did not have to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. The mitigation issue was also before the justices in the Kansas case of Sidney Gleason, who was sentenced to death for killing two people.
Justices’ statements during oral arguments suggested a majority disagreed with the Kansas Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the death sentences, according to the news coverage.
Scalia spent nearly a minute and a half reading a description of the December 2000 crime, according to the Washington Post account. The brothers broke into a home occupied by three men and two women, forced the victims into a closet, demanded they perform sex acts, drove them to ATMs to withdraw money, shot them at a soccer field, and drove over them with a truck. One woman survived.
Scalia noted that Kansas has nine people on death row, and said it indicated “that Kansans, unlike our Justice Breyer, do not think the death penalty is unconstitutional and indeed very much favor it.”
Justice Stephen G. Breyer called for briefing on whether the death penalty is constitutional in a June dissent that was joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Breyer wrote that he believes it is “highly likely that the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment.”
In a September speech, Scalia said he “wouldn’t be surprised” if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns the death penalty.
