Arkansas Supreme Court sides with inmates, declares execution law unconstitutional

[sinkingfeeling]

Source: MSNBC.com

The Arkansas Supreme Court struck down the state's execution law Friday, calling it unconstitutional.

In a split decision, the high court sided with 10 death row inmates who argued that, under Arkansas' constitution, only the Legislature can set execution policy. Legislators in 2009 voted to give that authority to the Department of Correction.

It wasn't immediately clear what the court's ruling will mean for the 40 men on death row in Arkansas. There aren't any pending executions, and the state hasn't put anyone to death since 2005, in part because of legal challenges like this one.

Since the reinstatement of capital punishment by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1976, Arkansas has been the only state to ever conduct three executions on the same night, according to The Death Penalty Information Center, a non-profit organization. Triple executions were done twice in Arkansas's history: first on Aug. 3, 1994, under Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, and then again on Jan. 8, 1997, under Gov. Mike Huckabee, records on DeathPenaltyInfo.org show.


Read more: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/06/22/12357759-arkansas-supreme-court-sides-with-inmates-declares-execution-law-unconstitutional?lite

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I'm not sure what this really means to those on death row. I think they will just revert back to the laws that were in place prior to 1983.

[hrmjustin]

1. goooood!!! killing is immoral no matter who does it. n/t

[Woody Woodpecker]

2. Every death penalty law should be stricken down

and replaced with long prison term with hard labor.

[cosmicone]

3. Freeper heads to explode in 5...4...3...2...1 n/t

[Art_from_Ark]

4. I remember the 1994 triple execution

It was a little close to home because a family member of mine was acquainted with the victim's family. The crime was a particularly grisly home invasion where the victim was brutally murdered-- a night of sheer horror, from what I heard. Thirteen years later, three of the four perpetrators were executed on the same day.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoyt_Franklin_Clines

[Seeking Serenity]

5. The Arkansas court did NOT rule the state's DP unconstitutional

as violating the U.S. or Arkansas constitutions' prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment.

The DP statute was held to violate the Arkansas Constitution as an unlawful delegation of powers from the legislative branch to the executive. It said that the 2009 statute gave the Dept. of Correction TOO MUCH discretion in how executions were performed.

Don't get too excited about this somehow being a bellwether against the death penalty.