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Here's the run down (as lifted in part from the bloggers at http://www.abovethelaw.com)

On Monday, the Supreme Court ordered a federal trial judge to take a closer look at the murder case against Troy Anthony Davis, a Georgia death row inmate. The SCOTUS directed the district judge to "receive testimony and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could have been obtained at the time of trial clearly establishes [Davis'] innocence."

Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, dissented. Justice Scalia questioned the viability of Davis's claim of actual innocence, then went one step further. In his dissent, Scalia states the following:

This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is "actually" innocent.

Pretty bold pronouncement by Scalia.

Professor Alan Dershowitz has called out Scalia today in an article entitled: "Scalia's Catholic Betrayal".
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and- ... -betrayal/

Let us be clear precisely what [Scalia's dissent] means. If a defendant were convicted, after a constitutionally unflawed trial, of murdering his wife, and then came to the Supreme Court with his very much alive wife at his side, and sought a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (namely that his wife was alive), these two justices would tell him, in effect: "Look, your wife may be alive as a matter of fact, but as a matter of constitutional law, she's dead, and as for you, Mr. Innocent Defendant, you're dead, too, since there is no constitutional right not to be executed merely because you're innocent."

It would be shocking enough for any justice of the Supreme Court to issue such a truly outrageous opinion, but it is particularly indefensible for Justices Scalia and Thomas, both of whom claim to be practicing Catholics, bound by the teaching of their church, to do moral justice. Justice Scalia has famously written, in the May 2002 issue of the conservative journal First Things, that if the Constitution compelled him to do something that was absolutely prohibited by mandatory Catholic rules, he would have no choice but to resign from the Supreme Court.

...
...

I hereby challenge Justice Scalia to a debate on whether Catholic doctrine permits the execution of a factually innocent person who has been tried, without constitutional flaw, but whose innocence is clearly established by new and indisputable evidence. Justice Scalia is always willing to debate issues involving religious teachings....

Although I am neither a rabbi nor a priest, I am confident that I am right and he is wrong under Catholic Doctrine. Perhaps it takes chutzpah to challenge a practicing Catholic on the teachings of his own faith, but that is a quality we share.

I invite him to participate in the debate at Harvard Law School, at Georgetown Law School, or anywhere else of his choosing. The stakes are high, because if he loses--if it is clear that his constitutional views permitting the execution of factually innocent defendants are inconsistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church--then, pursuant to his own published writings, he would have no choice but to conform his constitutional views to the teachings of the Catholic Church or to resign from the Supreme Court.

So Joe, this should be right up your alley - a Con law question mixed in with a Catholic church issue.

Thoughts?

Disgusting ruling by Scalia. And perfect example of why strict constitutionalists are nuts

SSSh...the gubmit is watching.....



Pretty ballsy statement to say you are guilty even if proven innocent.

dbackjon wrote:Disgusting ruling by Scalia. And perfect example of why strict constitutionalists are nuts

He is a justice of the Supreme Court, it is not his job to make sure this guy is innocent. It IS however his job to uphold the constitutionality of a judicial decision, which in this case, he has done. There was nothing that was illegal about the man's trial, therefore there is nothing, and should be nothing the Supreme Court can do, unfortunately. If there IS substantial evidence that this man is innocent, it should have been seen by a district court, and if permissible, should have been recognized. However, that not happening isn't unconstitutional in regards to the first trial which that evidence was not available.

wideright82 wrote:

dbackjon wrote:Disgusting ruling by Scalia. And perfect example of why strict constitutionalists are nuts

He is a justice of the Supreme Court, it is not his job to make sure this guy is innocent. It IS however his job to uphold the constitutionality of a judicial decision, which in this case, he has done. There was nothing that was illegal about the man's trial, therefore there is nothing, and should be nothing the Supreme Court can do, unfortunately. If there IS substantial evidence that this man is innocent, it should have been seen by a district court, and if permissible, should have been recognized. However, that not happening isn't unconstitutional in regards to the first trial which that evidence was not available.

Perhaps you are right, but do you really believe that regardless of the plain language, our Constitution is intended to protect the execution of a person who, while convicted at a completely Consitutional trial, was able to prove later that he was innocent?

danefan wrote:

wideright82 wrote:
He is a justice of the Supreme Court, it is not his job to make sure this guy is innocent. It IS however his job to uphold the constitutionality of a judicial decision, which in this case, he has done. There was nothing that was illegal about the man's trial, therefore there is nothing, and should be nothing the Supreme Court can do, unfortunately. If there IS substantial evidence that this man is innocent, it should have been seen by a district court, and if permissible, should have been recognized. However, that not happening isn't unconstitutional in regards to the first trial which that evidence was not available.

Perhaps you are right, but do you really believe that regardless of the plain language, our Constitution is intended to protect the execution of a person who, while convicted at a completely Consitutional trial, was able to prove later that he was innocent?

no, but keep in mind after that fair trial the man was PROVEN guilty. Now he has to prove innocence, I don't think the SCOTUS should protect the execution, but it would be completely abhorrent for them to neglect it as well, due to a clearly biased presentation of evidence that at this point, with out going through a trial, may or may NOT prove his innocence. As far as the law is concerned, at this point the man is guilty, and the SCOTUS' job is to uphold the law unless its ruling was constitutionally flawed.

Back in school (in the 80's) there was no shortage of bickering over Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana...
In a country where 6% of executions are of the innocent - the real question is about the death penalty...

Cleets Part 2 wrote:Back in school (in the 80's) there was no shortage of bickering over Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana...
In a country where 6% of executions are of the innocent - the real question is about the death penalty...

Agree

Cleets Part 2 wrote:Back in school (in the 80's) there was no shortage of bickering over Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana...
In a country where 6% of executions are of the innocent - the real question is about the death penalty...

Different standard of guilt for the imposition of the death penalty? Beyond a reasonable doubt isn't good enough. Beyond a shadow of a doubt or get rid of the death penalty?

UNI88 wrote:

Cleets Part 2 wrote:Back in school (in the 80's) there was no shortage of bickering over Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana...
In a country where 6% of executions are of the innocent - the real question is about the death penalty...

Different standard of guilt for the imposition of the death penalty? Beyond a reasonable doubt isn't good enough. Beyond a shadow of a doubt or get rid of the death penalty?

From a legal perspective you can't get any higher than beyond a reasonable doubt. Theoretically speaking "beyond a reasonable doubt" means that the jurors are 100% sure. If they aren't 100% sure and they convict it means they must have had "unresaonable" doubts.

I don't think its necessarily the standard of proof that matters. I think its the implementation of that standard of proof. There is always going to be the potential that the jury will not apply the standard correctly. Its an inherent flaw in our justice system and its a flaw that I don't think can be fixed.

danefan wrote:

UNI88 wrote:
Different standard of guilt for the imposition of the death penalty? Beyond a reasonable doubt isn't good enough. Beyond a shadow of a doubt or get rid of the death penalty?

From a legal perspective you can't get any higher than beyond a reasonable doubt. Theoretically speaking "beyond a reasonable doubt" means that the jurors are 100% sure. If they aren't 100% sure and they convict it means they must have had "unresaonable" doubts.

I don't think its necessarily the standard of proof that matters. I think its the implementation of that standard of proof. There is always going to be the potential that the jury will not apply the standard correctly. Its an inherent flaw in our justice system and its a flaw that I don't think can be fixed.

I didn't know that. Thanks for teaching me something!

Can you tell me what proximate cause means?

First off Davis is guilty as hell. Secondly, wideright nailed it. The SCOTUS did what they are charged to do. Now the question is should Davis be allowed to use the fact that his thug friends intimidated witnesses and jurors into recanting their statements and decisions to reopen the case?

danefan wrote:

UNI88 wrote:
Different standard of guilt for the imposition of the death penalty? Beyond a reasonable doubt isn't good enough. Beyond a shadow of a doubt or get rid of the death penalty?

From a legal perspective you can't get any higher than beyond a reasonable doubt. Theoretically speaking "beyond a reasonable doubt" means that the jurors are 100% sure. If they aren't 100% sure and they convict it means they must have had "unresaonable" doubts.

I don't think its necessarily the standard of proof that matters. I think its the implementation of that standard of proof. There is always going to be the potential that the jury will not apply the standard correctly. Its an inherent flaw in our justice system and its a flaw that I don't think can be fixed.

I agree with your last statement completely...and I feel it is an excellent starting point to argue for the total (and final) elimination of the death penalty in this country...

Col Hogan wrote:

danefan wrote:
From a legal perspective you can't get any higher than beyond a reasonable doubt. Theoretically speaking "beyond a reasonable doubt" means that the jurors are 100% sure. If they aren't 100% sure and they convict it means they must have had "unresaonable" doubts.

I don't think its necessarily the standard of proof that matters. I think its the implementation of that standard of proof. There is always going to be the potential that the jury will not apply the standard correctly. Its an inherent flaw in our justice system and its a flaw that I don't think can be fixed.

I agree with your last statement completely...and I feel it is an excellent starting point to argue for the total (and final) elimination of the death penalty in this country...

agree entirely

bobbythekidd wrote:First off Davis is guilty as hell. Secondly, wideright nailed it. The SCOTUS did what they are charged to do. Now the question is should Davis be allowed to use the fact that his thug friends intimidated witnesses and jurors into recanting their statements and decisions to reopen the case?

The SCOTUS did what they are charged to do. That is correct. Scalia argued against the Court's decision. He was the dissent.

UNI88 wrote:

danefan wrote:
From a legal perspective you can't get any higher than beyond a reasonable doubt. Theoretically speaking "beyond a reasonable doubt" means that the jurors are 100% sure. If they aren't 100% sure and they convict it means they must have had "unresaonable" doubts.

I don't think its necessarily the standard of proof that matters. I think its the implementation of that standard of proof. There is always going to be the potential that the jury will not apply the standard correctly. Its an inherent flaw in our justice system and its a flaw that I don't think can be fixed.

I didn't know that. Thanks for teaching me something!

Can you tell me what proximate cause means?

I would love to teach you about proximate cause, but it would take me a while. Perhaps if I get some time tomorrow I can lay out the plight of Mrs. Pfalsgraff who sued the Long Island Rail Road and how Justice Cardozo screwed up the lives of 1st year law students for the rest of time.....

wideright82 wrote:

Cleets Part 2 wrote:Back in school (in the 80's) there was no shortage of bickering over Cesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana...
In a country where 6% of executions are of the innocent - the real question is about the death penalty...

Agree

Disagree. Guys like the one in Iowa that walked in and shot the coach should be fried. Slowly.

danefan wrote:

bobbythekidd wrote:First off Davis is guilty as hell. Secondly, wideright nailed it. The SCOTUS did what they are charged to do. Now the question is should Davis be allowed to use the fact that his thug friends intimidated witnesses and jurors into recanting their statements and decisions to reopen the case?

The SCOTUS did what they are charged to do. That is correct. Scalia argued against the Court's decision. He was the dissent.

Yeah, I'm not entirely sure what Scalia's stance was. It almost seems as though he was saying the same thing I did, but for some reason couldn't get over the idea of giving him another trial. I guess really that isn't the supreme's court responsibility in his eyes, even though they are the last appeal. Seems like a case that maybe shouldn't have been brought before them, and maybe that was his disconnect.

AZGrizFan wrote:

wideright82 wrote:

Agree

Disagree. Guys like the one in Iowa that walked in and shot the coach should be fried. Slowly.

well i am all for the death penalty in theory. Just not so much in execution (no pun intended)

wideright82 wrote:

AZGrizFan wrote:
Disagree. Guys like the one in Iowa that walked in and shot the coach should be fried. Slowly.

well i am all for the death penalty in theory. Just not so much in execution (no pun intended)

I think there's a misapplication of the punishment, in general. It's awarded when it's not necessarily warranted. But in cut and dried cases like the one I mentioned, I've got NO problem with it.

AZGrizFan wrote:

wideright82 wrote:

well i am all for the death penalty in theory. Just not so much in execution (no pun intended)

I think there's a misapplication of the punishment, in general. It's awarded when it's not necessarily warranted. But in cut and dried cases like the one I mentioned, I've got NO problem with it.

I'll drink to that

wideright82 wrote:

AZGrizFan wrote:
I think there's a misapplication of the punishment, in general. It's awarded when it's not necessarily warranted. But in cut and dried cases like the one I mentioned, I've got NO problem with it.

I'll drink to that

You'll drink to anything.

AZGrizFan wrote:

wideright82 wrote:

I'll drink to that

You'll drink to anything.

cheers

danefan wrote:Here's the run down (as lifted in part from the bloggers at http://www.abovethelaw.com)

On Monday, the Supreme Court ordered a federal trial judge to take a closer look at the murder case against Troy Anthony Davis, a Georgia death row inmate. The SCOTUS directed the district judge to "receive testimony and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could have been obtained at the time of trial clearly establishes [Davis'] innocence."

Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, dissented. Justice Scalia questioned the viability of Davis's claim of actual innocence, then went one step further. In his dissent, Scalia states the following:

This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is "actually" innocent.

Pretty bold pronouncement by Scalia.

Professor Alan Dershowitz has called out Scalia today in an article entitled: "Scalia's Catholic Betrayal".
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and- ... -betrayal/

Let us be clear precisely what [Scalia's dissent] means. If a defendant were convicted, after a constitutionally unflawed trial, of murdering his wife, and then came to the Supreme Court with his very much alive wife at his side, and sought a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (namely that his wife was alive), these two justices would tell him, in effect: "Look, your wife may be alive as a matter of fact, but as a matter of constitutional law, she's dead, and as for you, Mr. Innocent Defendant, you're dead, too, since there is no constitutional right not to be executed merely because you're innocent."

It would be shocking enough for any justice of the Supreme Court to issue such a truly outrageous opinion, but it is particularly indefensible for Justices Scalia and Thomas, both of whom claim to be practicing Catholics, bound by the teaching of their church, to do moral justice. Justice Scalia has famously written, in the May 2002 issue of the conservative journal First Things, that if the Constitution compelled him to do something that was absolutely prohibited by mandatory Catholic rules, he would have no choice but to resign from the Supreme Court.

...
...

I hereby challenge Justice Scalia to a debate on whether Catholic doctrine permits the execution of a factually innocent person who has been tried, without constitutional flaw, but whose innocence is clearly established by new and indisputable evidence. Justice Scalia is always willing to debate issues involving religious teachings....

Although I am neither a rabbi nor a priest, I am confident that I am right and he is wrong under Catholic Doctrine. Perhaps it takes chutzpah to challenge a practicing Catholic on the teachings of his own faith, but that is a quality we share.

I invite him to participate in the debate at Harvard Law School, at Georgetown Law School, or anywhere else of his choosing. The stakes are high, because if he loses--if it is clear that his constitutional views permitting the execution of factually innocent defendants are inconsistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church--then, pursuant to his own published writings, he would have no choice but to conform his constitutional views to the teachings of the Catholic Church or to resign from the Supreme Court.

So Joe, this should be right up your alley - a Con law question mixed in with a Catholic church issue.

Thoughts?

Having read Scalia's dissent in full, I think Dershowitz is distorting the meaning of Scalia's comment. In context, Scalia was saying that the issue of whether a person is "actually" innocent is a determination made by the state criminal justice system.

The habeas procedure exists as a level of constitutional review to ensure that constitutional procedures have been employed by the state in achieving a criminal conviction. In reviewing the habea petition, the federal court does not function as an additional level of appellate review in which the guilt or innocence of the defendant is at issue.

If you read Scalia's quote carefully, what he saying is there is no precedent of the court which would allow the use of a habeas petition to second guess or re-litigate the evidence pertaining to guilt or innocence -- habeas corpus being a tool of procedural review.

I doubt Scalia would actually say that which Dershowitz attributes to him: that the constitution permits the execution of an actually innocent defendant.

In any event, the Supreme Court has remanded to the district court for the purpose of essentially reviewing the issue of guilt or innocence. So now there is precedent for the use of the habeas petition as tool to review claims of actual innocence, and for the district court to second guess state court juries. I think it will be interesting to see what limitations are placed on the use of a habeas petition to re-litigate guilt or innocence (i.e., only allowed when witnesses have publicly recanted, etc.).

BTW, Dershowitz's hypotheticals are sometimes so silly that they are a disgrace to Harvard Law School. Do you seriously think that a man convicted of killing his wife, who later is discovered alive, would need to raise the issue of his "actual innocence" by way of a habeas petition? What would happen is that the state prosecutor's office which obtained the conviction would ask the state court which convicted him to vacate the conviction, and it would be vacated. Our system trusts that, in such situations, that our prosecutors and courts act appropriately, and it is absurd to even suggest that such a defendant would need habeas review in federal courts.

Given the miscarriages of justice applied to minorities in our recent history, you have more faith in state courts than I do, Joe.



Then again, in the past the Supreme Court has been only slightly ahead of some state courts