A Jury Must Be Able to FULLY Consider ALL Mitigating Evidence in Death Cases

Brewer v. Quarterman

In this case Brewer was convicted of murder committed during a robbery. He offered evidence that he was depressed, manipulated, had been abused, and had a drug problem. Brewer’s proffered jury instructions giving effect to this evidence were denied and the jury was instructed only to answer whether Brewer had committed the crime and whether he would constitute a continuing threat to society. As in Penry, Brewer’s evidence was a double edged sword – however mitigating it was, it was equally inculpating as a demonstration of future dangerousness
A Penry violation occurs whenever a statute or judicial gloss on a statute prevents the jury from fully considering (in the sense that it may give effect to a considered moral judgment) all evidence that may justify the imposition of a life sentence rather than a death sentence. Neither quantity nor quality (ie: transitory nature of a mental condition) qualify this rule. The lower court erred when it equated “full effect” with “sufficient effect.”

The Chief Justice, with Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Alito, dissenting, argue that Jurek v. Texas, Franklin v. Lynaugh, Penry v. Lynaugh, Graham v. Collins, and Johnson v. Texas make up the Supreme Court’s guidance on this issue (until now) and that that guidance has amounted to – ‘it depends on the particular characteristics of the evidence.’ Under AEDPA the standard is that a state-court decision can only be set aside if it is “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law as determined by the Supreme Court. Either this standard, whether right or wrong, was not misapplied, or the majority is cherry picking the one case that stands for the proposition it endorses today. In either case, the law was not “clearly established.” The dissent then rehashes its points from the previous case, particularly that the “limited view” of Penry, adopted in Graham, at the very least justified the lower courts in their application of the law; that even if it was wrong as a constitutional matter, it was reasonable under the AEDPA.

Justice Scalia, with Justices Thomas and Alito, dissenting, while they agree with the above dissent, maintain that “limiting a jury’s discretion to consider all mitigating evidence does not violate the eighth Amendment.