Supreme Court declines to take up constitutionality of the death penalty

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WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Monday turned down a Louisiana murderer’s request that the justices take his case to decide whether the death penalty is unconstitutional.

Lamondre Tucker drew noted support only from the two justices who previously have said the court should consider the question – Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Tucker “may well have received the death penalty not because of the comparative egregiousness of his crime, but because of an aribtrary feature of his case, namely, geography,” Breyer wrote.

Tucker was convinced of killing his pregnant girlfriend in 2008 and was sentenced to death in Caddo Parish, which Breyer said “imposes almost half the death sentences in Louisiana, even though it accounts for only 5 percent of the state’s population and 5 percent of its homicides,” Breyer wrote.

Last term, the justice said the court should take another look at whether the death penalty can be imposed in a constitutional manner. But it takes at least four justices to take a case, and only Breyer and Ginsburg said they would have accepted Tucker’s.

Death penalty opponents were encouraged by Breyer’s words last term. But it seems unlikely a court with only eight members would take up such an issue.

The case is Tucker v. Louisiana.

(c) 2016, The Washington Post ยท Robert Barnes

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