One of the scariest things about the death penalty is how randomly it is applied. If Ronald B. Smith had committed his crimes in 49 other states, he’d be alive. But Smith was tried and convicted in Alabama, and Alabama is the only state left that allows a particularly quirky application of the death penalty. Bad luck, I guess.
Smith was convicted for killing a convince store clerk in 1995, but a jury recommended that Smith be sentenced to life in prison. The trial judge overrode the jury’s sentencing determination, and sentenced Smith to death.
Alabama is the only state left that allows judges to sentence defendants to death over the opinion of the jury. The New York Times reported:
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Since the United States Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, a recent report found, judges in Alabama have overridden recommendations of life 107 times and of death 11 times.
So you are saying that predominately white Alabama judges are routinely overriding, some might say nullifying, juries to put people to death? Interesting, tell me more.
The Supreme Court upheld Alabama’s death scheme in 1995. But since then, some justices have questioned the practice. In January, the Supreme Court struck down Florida’s capital scheme, which shared similar elements with Alabama.
But the lower courts denied Smith’s appeals in this case, and the still-eight-member Supreme Court deadlocked. Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan said they would have granted the stay. Tie goes to the needle.
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Ronald Smith is dead now. He paid the ultimate price for his crimes. But we all share the costs of our inconsistent use of the death penalty.
Alabama Inmate Executed After Supreme Court Refuses a Stay [New York Times]
Elie Mystal is an editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at [email protected]. He will resist.