Daryl Atkins, saved from execution by the Supreme Court three years ago, has had his IQ retested, and it is now 74. The doctor who retested him says that the new reading should be discounted, but the prosecutors have used the new test as an excuse to put him up for re-trial, so that he can after all be executed.
Apparently the defense are claiming that Atkins is, too, still retarded.
These days, I do wonder what the point of the American Constitution is, at all. Execution was barred by the Supreme Court as violating the "cruel and unusual punishment" clause of the Constitution. This ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1976. But again in 2002 the Supreme Court ruled that defendants who were significantly mentally impaired could not be executed, on the same basis.
So now a man is apparently bright enough to face a penalty he was not considered bright enough to face before. It strikes me that what the defence should be trying to establish (before they just burn the Bill of Rights and be done with it) is not that the guy still is retarded, but that re-trying him falls not only under "cruel and unusual punishment" under the 8th Amendment, but also under the Double Jeopardy rule - "nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb" - The Fifth Amendment. It does not state specifically that a person need have been found innocent the first time, neither does it specifically state that a person is undergoing a fact-establishing trial the second time - it simply states that no person shall be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb. And clearly Daryl Atkins is here being put in jeopardy of his life for a second time.
The saddest thing is that the prosecution lawyers are not just flagrantly violating the Bill of Rights, they are also sabotaging subtle ways in which the United States has recently been attempting not to stand alone amongst the democratic nations in the way it treats its capital criminals. Nobody else in the Western Alliance even commits anymore, as it is barbaric and abhorrent, but the United States not only continues to use capital punishment but until 2002 it executed the mentally ill and intellectually retarded (something we in Britain did not do right back to the Victorian era) and it joins only four other countries in the world that executes minors: Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran. I think most Americans would rather that their record in this matter was not repeatedly highlighted by ambitious lawyers who are quite happy to piss all over the Constitution in order to kill someone.
Apparently the defense are claiming that Atkins is, too, still retarded.
These days, I do wonder what the point of the American Constitution is, at all. Execution was barred by the Supreme Court as violating the "cruel and unusual punishment" clause of the Constitution. This ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1976. But again in 2002 the Supreme Court ruled that defendants who were significantly mentally impaired could not be executed, on the same basis.
So now a man is apparently bright enough to face a penalty he was not considered bright enough to face before. It strikes me that what the defence should be trying to establish (before they just burn the Bill of Rights and be done with it) is not that the guy still is retarded, but that re-trying him falls not only under "cruel and unusual punishment" under the 8th Amendment, but also under the Double Jeopardy rule - "nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb" - The Fifth Amendment. It does not state specifically that a person need have been found innocent the first time, neither does it specifically state that a person is undergoing a fact-establishing trial the second time - it simply states that no person shall be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb. And clearly Daryl Atkins is here being put in jeopardy of his life for a second time.
The saddest thing is that the prosecution lawyers are not just flagrantly violating the Bill of Rights, they are also sabotaging subtle ways in which the United States has recently been attempting not to stand alone amongst the democratic nations in the way it treats its capital criminals. Nobody else in the Western Alliance even commits anymore, as it is barbaric and abhorrent, but the United States not only continues to use capital punishment but until 2002 it executed the mentally ill and intellectually retarded (something we in Britain did not do right back to the Victorian era) and it joins only four other countries in the world that executes minors: Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran. I think most Americans would rather that their record in this matter was not repeatedly highlighted by ambitious lawyers who are quite happy to piss all over the Constitution in order to kill someone.
