[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----N.C., LA., OHIO, KY., MO., CALIF., USA

[Rick Halperin]

Dec. 31




NORTH CAROLINA:

Our Opinion: Flawed punishment


Death row inmate James E. Williams completed his sentence last week. He wasn't 
executed. He died of natural causes, 22 years after his conviction for murder 
in Randolph County.

Several offenders have been on death row longer than he was, including Blanche 
Taylor Moore. Her infamous case was featured in Sunday's News & Record. She was 
sentenced to death 25 years ago for the arsenic-poisoning murder of her 
boyfriend, Raymond Reid, in Forsyth County. Although she was never convicted of 
any other killings, there was strong evidence to suggest she'd dispatched her 
father, mother-in-law, sister-in-law and 1st husband the same way.

Moore is 82, 1 of 2 women on death row. In all, 148 offenders are waiting for 
execution - 51 of whom have been waiting for more than 20 years.

No one has been executed in North Carolina since 2006. This makes some 
politicians impatient. The legislature approved a bill this year that 
eliminated the requirement that physicians participate in executions and 
permits the state to keep information about the drugs used in lethal injections 
secret to avoid public protests against manufacturers.

These measures may be expedient, but they won't cut through legal challenges 
that are likely to keep executions on hold for years to come. It makes more 
sense to do what Vincent Rabil suggested in a column published in the News & 
Record's Ideas section Sunday: End capital punishment.

Rabil, a former Forsyth County prosecutor who helped win the death-penalty 
conviction against Moore in 1990, is now a defense attorney. He noted how much 
has changed over the years:

"Death verdicts have dramatically declined from highs of more than 20 per year 
in the 1990s to 3 in 2014 and none in 2015. This isn't for lack of trying. 
Prosecutors try about a dozen capital cases each year. Jurors are simply 
finding life without parole more appropriate."

Rabil argues that the legal standards required to win a death sentence are very 
high, making it a time-consuming and expensive process. But a conviction is 
just the beginning of the cost. Appeals drag on for many years. Furthermore, 
housing inmates on death row is expensive.

The cost is one reason why many conservatives say it's time to end the death 
penalty. Nebraska abolished capital punishment this year. Conservatives 
Concerned About the Death Penalty has an active chapter in North Carolina and 
counts state Rep. Jon Hardister (R-Guilford) as a supporter. One question this 
group asks is: If you don't trust government to operate efficiently and 
effectively, why do you trust it to take someone's life?

Many people have been sentenced to death in error. Henry McCollum was released 
from prison last year after it was proven he was wrongly convicted of murder 
more than 30 years ago. If it wasn't for "government inefficiency," he would 
have been executed long ago.

Many legislators fear a backlash from voters if they move to abolish the death 
penalty. Yet, juries trust the sentence of life without parole for murderers. 
Voters will, too. The worst offenders should die in prison, and they will - but 
not by a flawed system of capital punishment.

(source: Greensboro News & Record)






LOUISIANA:

Prosecutors to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate death sentence in 1993 
killing of Baton Rouge police officer


East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore III said Thursday his 
office will ask the nation's highest court to review and correct a federal 
appeals court ruling that would spare Kevan Brumfield the death penalty if 
allowed to stand.

A 3-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans found 
late Wednesday that Brumfield, 42, is intellectually disabled and thus 
ineligible for execution - a finding that Moore said was disappointing to the 
family, friends and co-workers of the late Cpl. Betty Smothers, killed 23 years 
ago.

"I feel the hurt of Cpl. Smothers' family, receiving this court's decision at 
what should have been a peaceful time despite the decades of agony that they 
have endured," he said. "We will fight for justice for Cpl. Smothers, her 
family and our community."

Moore said his office will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review and reverse the 
5th Circuit panel's decision.

"No court decision can ever change the fact that this convicted armed robber 
and murderer should face death as required by the laws of the state of 
Louisiana for organizing, leading and executing the deadly ambush of a Baton 
Rouge city police officer and a business manager," he added.

Former NFL, Florida State University and Catholic High School running back 
Warrick Dunn, the oldest of Smothers' 6 children, declined comment through 
Moore.

The deadly ambush occurred Jan. 7, 1993, as the 36-year-old Smothers, who was 
working an off-duty security job, drove a grocery store manager to a Jefferson 
Highway bank to make a night deposit. The manager, Kimen Lee, survived the 
attack.

Brumfield, who was accused of firing the shots that killed Smothers, was found 
guilty and sentenced to die in 1995. Henri Broadway, also of Baton Rouge, was 
convicted later that year and condemned to die. He was accused of firing the 
bullets that wounded Lee.

Broadway, 45, is seeking a new trial, but he is not challenging his mental 
capacity. He claims his trial attorneys were ineffective. His case is pending 
before state District Judge Mike Erwin.

U.S. District Judge James Brady, of Baton Rouge, ruled in early 2012 that 
Brumfield is mentally retarded, what is now referred to as intellectually 
disabled. After considerable legal wrangling over the next several years in 
both the 5th Circuit and Supreme Court, 5th Circuit Judges Carolyn Dineen King, 
Edith Brown Clement and Jennifer Walker Elrod ruled Wednesday that Brady did 
not err in his decision.

Moore argues the appellate court's ruling, if allowed to stand, will only 
encourage capital murder defendants to "raise false claims of mental 
retardation" in an attempt to avoid the death penalty.

(source: The Advocate)




OHIO:

Prosecutor seeking death penalty for accused killer, rapist


Lake County Prosecutor Charles Coulson is seeking the death penalty for the man 
accused of shooting a Concord Township woman to death inside her home in a 
multi-crime incident.

Juan Manuel Razo Ramirez, A.K.A. Juan Razo, 36, was charged Dec. 17 in a 
16-count indictment in Lake County Common Pleas Court.

Ramirez is accused of murdering 60-year-old Margaret "Peggy" Kostelnik July 27 
after allegedly trying to rape a 14-year-old girl at Lake Metroparks' Helen 
Hazen Wyman Park in Concord Township. He is also charged with trying to kill 
Lake County Sheriff's Capt. Carl Dondorfer and/or Lake County Sheriff's Sgt. 
Patrick Patterson and/or Geauga County Sheriff's Deputy Steve Deardowski.

In addition, he is suspected of shooting Mary Kable, 40, of Painesville, in the 
arm in front of her children while on the Greenway Corridor in the Concord and 
Painesville areas after committing the other 2 crimes.

Ramirez is charged with 2 counts of aggravated murder, 2 counts of attempted 
murder, rape, 2 counts of attempted rape, 3 counts of kidnapping, 2 counts of 
aggravated burglary, 2 counts of aggravated robbery and 2 counts of felonious 
assault. He is also charged with 6 death penalty specifications and firearm 
specifications.

According to the indictment:

Acting with prior calculation and armed with a .22-caliber rifle, Ramirez 
entered Kostelnik's Ravenna Road home by force or deception to commit a theft 
offense. Once inside the house, he forced himself on her sexually and killed 
her.

On that same day, he kidnapped and tried to rape a minor and tried to kill 
Kable and also discharged his firearm on at least 1 responding officer.

Ramirez - a Mexican citizen who does not have lawful permanent residence in the 
United States - had been in Lake County Jail on a $10 million cash bond. 
However, he is now being held without bail, said Coulson.

Ramirez surrendered July 27 following an exchange of gunfire with police after 
dozens of officials searched the Greenway Corridor for hours.

The 1st count of aggravated murder has to do with prior calculation and design. 
The other aggravated murder count alleges that Ramirez purposely caused the 
victim's death after committing the burglary, kidnapping, rape and/or robbery 
charges.

Ramirez's attorney, Lake County Public Defender Charles R. Grieshammer, 
declined comment other than to say he would be bringing in at least 1 other 
defense lawyer to assist with the case.

No hearing dates have yet been scheduled.

(source: The News-Herald)






KENTUCKY:

U.S. Supreme Courtroom reinstates Kentucky inmate's demise sentence


The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday reinstated the death sentence of a Kentucky 
man convicted in the 1997 murders of a Louisville couple including a pregnant 
woman who was strangled and whose body was found with scissors sticking out 
from her neck.

The justices, in an unsigned opinion, reversed a February ruling by the 
Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that had thrown out 
convicted murderer Roger Wheeler's death sentence.

The appeals court had said Wheeler deserved a new sentencing proceeding because 
the state trial court judge had wrongly excluded a juror who had expressed some 
reservations about imposing capital punishment.

The judge's move violated Wheele's right for his case to be heard by an 
impartial jury under the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the appeals 
court ruled.

The Supreme Court disagreed. The justices said the appeals court should have 
deferred to Kentucky's high court, which found there was no violation. A 
federal law bars federal courts from 2nd-guessing state appeals court decisions 
in death penalty cases unless there is a violation of "clearly established" 
federal law under Supreme Court precedent.

Wheeler was convicted of the 1997 murders in Louisville of Nigel Malone and 
Nairobi Warfield in the apartment they shared.

The Supreme Court's opinion noted that Malone was stabbed 9 times and that 
Warfield, who was pregnant, was strangled to death, and a pair of scissors 
stuck out from her neck. DNA linked Wheeler to the crime.

The case is White v. Wheeler, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 14-1372

(source: Reuters)

**************

Prosecutor will seek death penalty in Kentucky boy's death


Authorities believe that Exantus broke into Tipton's home in Versailles, Ky. 
early Monday. Police said Ronald Exantus, 32, of Indianapolis is accused of 
breaking into the house where the boy lived with his parents and siblings in 
Versailles, near Lexington in Kentucky's thoroughbred and bourbon country.

Ronald Exantus was indicted Wednesday for murder, burglary and 3 counts of 
assault. Investigators say it is unclear why the registered nurse drove 
hundreds of miles to commit a murder. He also added that he "filed notice 
Wednesday that he intends to pursue the death penalty".

The Versailles community is heartbroken over the tragic incident, and they are 
offering their support by donating and acquiring clothing for the family. He 
declined to elaborate, and gave no information about why Exantus went to the 
boy's home. "I have discussed various things with him on 2 separate occasions 
this morning and he's not able to really discuss anything; he's not here", 
Hofler told reporters afterward. "They have enough to do just to nurture their 
children". Football Stadium where he played football. He loved everybody." He 
added, "I don't know what kind of anger this man had in his heart. "He was that 
kind of kid".

Woodford Youth Football League President Peter Barnhardt told WLKY; 'You know, 
he's playing football right now. He appeared in a Woodford County courtroom and 
entered a plea of not guilty Monday with bond set at $1 million by District 
Court Judge Vanessa Dickson.

Logan's funeral will be held Friday at 11 a.m.at the football field in 
Versailles. His next arraignment will be held January 6 at Woodford Circuit 
Court.

(source: The Telegraph Times)






MISSOURI:

Missouri's Death Penalty in 2015: A Broken and Crumbling System


The Death Penalty Information Center's 2015 Year End Report, released on 
December 16, 2015, demonstrates that by every measure - public opinion, death 
sentences, and executions - the death penalty declined in 2015 nationwide. 
Across the U.S., there were 49 new death sentences in 2015, a 33% decline over 
last year's total. In addition, the 28 total U.S. executions marked the lowest 
number since 1991. Only 6 states carried out executions this year, and Missouri 
was 1 of them.

Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (MADP) has conducted an 
in-depth analysis of trends in our own state, which is linked below. A snapshot 
of Missouri developments includes:

6 Executions in 2015

No new death sentences in 2015 or 2014

1 Commutation: Kimber Edwards to Life in Prison

1 Death Row Inmate's Sentence Vacated: Reggie Clemons 4 Stays of Execution, (1 
later overturned)

Frank Baumgartner (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), released a 
report demonstrating that racial and geographic disparities were cause for 
"concerns that the death penalty is applied in an unfair, capricious, and 
arbitrary manner" in Missouri.

Sr. Helen Prejean came to Springfield and Kansas City, MO, to speak about the 
death penalty and raise awareness among college students.??? New voices from 
Evangelical communities begin to express concerns about capital punishment, at 
both the national and state level.

Missouri executed 6 people this year, marking it as an outlier among other 
states. This year's executions illustrate serious problems in the application 
of the death penalty. Missouri executed the following men this year: Walter 
Storey, Cecil Clayton, Andre Cole, Richard Strong, David Zink and Roderick 
Nunley. These cases illustrate numerous problems with the death penalty, 
including the execution of those with intellectual disabilities (such as a hole 
in the brain), sentences reached by all-white juries in diverse communities, 
inadequate and inexperienced legal counsel, mental illness and competency 
issues, as well as the foreclosure of a possibility of redemption.

6 people were exonerated from death row across the country, highlighting the 
risk of wrongful convictions in capital cases. They spent a total of over a 
century on death row, and an average of 19 years in prison for crimes they did 
not commit.???Missouri has had 4 exonerations since 1973, most recently 
Reginald Griffin in 2013.

As noted by Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty State 
Coordinator, Staci Pratt, "These national trends clearly show that the death 
penalty is falling out of favor as the public becomes more aware of this broken 
system. It is time for Missouri to reconsider this costly and error-prone 
punishment. Our system of capital punishment is crumbling beneath the weight of 
an arbitrary, racially, and geographically biased approach to criminal 
justice."

To read MADP's 2015 Annual Report on the Death Penalty in our State, please 
follow the link appearing below. In reference to the Report, Pratt observed, 
"No new capital sentences in 2015, as well as stays of execution for 4 men on 
our death row, and the commutation for Kimber Edwards this year, shed light on 
a state which is evolving. The executions we saw this year represent 
anachronistic remnants from 15 years ago, when those sentences were handed 
down. Today, we see change."

READ THE FULL REPORT HERE: http://madpmo.hoster904.com/?page_id=196.

(source: Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty)






CALIFORNIA:

Death penalty possible in Salinas child abuse case


The Monterey County District Attorney's office will be seeking first-degree 
murder charges with the possibility of the death penalty in the case of 2 
children found dead in a Redding storage locker.

Preliminary autopsy results on the children found that they died as a result of 
ongoing abuse that began in Salinas, Salinas Police Chief Kelly McMillin said. 
Based on the autopsy and preparatory acts that led up to the deaths, Monterey 
County District Attorney Dean D. Flippo also said he feels very confident that 
the office will also be able to prove that the children also died in Salinas.

McMillin said the case was the most egregious child abuse homicide case that he 
had ever seen.

On Friday, former Salinas residents Tami Joy Huntsman, 39, and Gonzalo Curiel, 
17, were arrested for felony abuse, torture and mayhem in Quincy after someone 
tipped off authorities of possible child abuse.

A responding Plumas County deputy found a starving 9-year-old girl locked in a 
car with severe injuries.

The Plumas County News reported that the girl weighed about 40 pounds, had 
broken bones in her shoulder, broken fingers, a dislocated jaw, missing or 
loose teeth as well as open sores and lice. She underwent hours of surgery at a 
Sacramento area hospital on Sunday and remains in protective custody.

While further investigating the child abuse, investigators learned that there 
were possibly 2 dead children in a storage unit in Redding, and the information 
was sent to the Redding Police Department.

Redding officers responded to an AAA Enterprise Store-All facility and found 2 
young children's bodies in a plastic container there.

Authorities contacted Salinas police regarding 2 children, identified as 
3-year-old Delylah Tara and 6-year-old Shaun Tara, and on Sunday, Salinas 
police did a welfare check at a home on Fremont Street.

Social workers visited home before children's deaths

Officers forced entry into an apartment there and also entered the children in 
a statewide missing person database as they continued to investigate the 
whereabouts of the children.

In a Thursday afternoon press conference, Monterey County District Attorney 
Dean Flippo said he's convinced that the children found in Redding are the 
3-year-old and 6-year-old reported missing out of Salinas.

Flippo and McMillin said that the various relationships between Huntsman, 
Curiel and the children were not yet clear.

However, it does appear that the 9-year-old, 6-year-old, and 3-year-old are 
nieces and a nephew of Huntsman. It hasn't been confirmed that the 9-year-old 
is the sibling of the other 2 though.

Huntsman also reportedly has other children, including a 15-year-old and 
12-year-old twins.

Many details of the case remain unclear. Flippo and McMillin said they were 
still trying to sort through "sketchy" details themselves and also cited the 
ongoing investigation as reasons to not release further information at this 
time.

Monterey County Department of Social Services had 4 prior referrals of general 
neglect at the family's Fremont Street home over the last year, most recently 
in August, officials have said.

(source: The Salinas Californian)

***************

DA Tony Rackauckas Bullies Judge Who Slammed Cheating in Death-Penalty Case


District Attorney Tony Rackauckas' 10-month-old gamble that the Orange County 
snitch scandal would fizzle out has proven less than prophetic. In March, 
Superior Court Judge Thomas M. Goethals booted Rackauckas and his office (OCDA) 
from People v. Scott Dekraai, a death-penalty case, after determining 
prosecutors can't be trusted to act ethically. Goethals' historic move meant 
California Attorney General Kamala Harris would, given Dekraai's massacre 
confession, take over penalty-phase duties.

Until that point, Rackauckas' staff spent four years blaming Assistant Public 
Defender Scott Sanders, Dekraai's attorney, for torturing the victims' 
survivors by stalling the case. We now know OCDA's tactics of hiding evidence 
and filing deceptive court records caused the delays. Even the DA's 
Kool-Aid-guzzlers had to concede the fake outrage after he urged Harris to 
fight her assignment. Rather than assume control over Dekraai-a move that may 
have landed the defendant on death row months ago-the AG is taking what could 
be a multiyear appellate route.

You might assume someone 2-faced with crime victims had emptied his 
dirty-tricks bag. But Rackauckas - who is a pleasant, engaging fellow in person 
- seems to have an endless repertoire of shenanigans. Or, perhaps like a 
recalcitrant juvenile, he's ingrained with a willingness to say anything to 
escape accountability.

The latest evidence of this flaw emerged in the wake of a sensational Dec. 3 
ruling by Richard M. King, an Orange County Superior Court judge. King is not 
only a well-respected member of the bench, but, like Goethals, he is also a 
former accomplished OCDA homicide prosecutor and Rackauckas colleague. My files 
contain a circa early-1980s-era photo of the three men smiling together.

Local courthouses are teeming with judges who proclaim neutrality but have no 
intention of siding against Rackauckas on disputes entailing shady government 
conduct. Indeed, some of the more obnoxious members of the bench tout their 
pro-prosecution bias, daring defense lawyers to complain. In recent weeks, I 
witnessed such an episode, sought comment from the abused attorney and became 
the recipient of a plea for silence because of feared retaliation.

Yet, like Goethals before him, King can no longer stomach Rackauckas' antics. 
In November, he startled courthouse observers by overturning OCDA's 
eyebrow-raising win in People v. Eric Ortiz. The prosecution team had trampled 
Ortiz's constitutional rights by securing an illegal jailhouse confession, then 
trying to cover up their mischief.

2 weeks ago, King bravely dove deeper into the cesspool. His 49-page remarks 
were the legal equivalent of taking a mahogany 2-by-4 and slamming it against 
the DA's thick skull. The message was unambiguous: Clean up your act, Tony!

King's ruling noted that OCDA disqualified - or papered - Goethals just once in 
35 murder cases between Dec. 7, 2010, and Feb. 24, 2014. But in early 2014, the 
agency launched what King calls a "blanket papering" campaign by disqualifying 
Goethals 46 times out of 49 trial assignments from Feb. 25, 2014, to September 
2015.

"This disparity [between years] is not coincidental," King wrote.

The attack on Goethals occurred precisely after he granted Sanders a special 
evidentiary hearing in Dekraai that, after months of testimony, concluded 
deputies inside the Orange County Sheriff's Department (OCSD) repeatedly 
committed perjury and prosecutors "habitually ignored" the law.

While recusing OCDA from the case in March, Goethals declared, "The district 
attorney cannot or will not, in this case, comply with discovery orders of this 
court and the related constitutional and statutory mandates that guarantee this 
defendant's right to due process and a fair trial."

Rackauckas and his lieutenants reacted bitterly, employing surrogates to imply 
Goethals was a loon with an unspecified ulterior agenda. They also pondered a 
campaign to remove him from the bench. At a press conference, the defiant, 
72-year-old DA claimed defense lawyers such as Sanders were the real villains 
and suggested reforms to strengthen current monumental powers of prosecutors. 
King watched the events, hoping clearer minds inside OCDA would eventually 
prevail. That hope still hasn't materialized.

In September, King sent 4 more murder trials to Goethals' C45, the county's 
highest courtroom on the 11th floor, Santa Ana tower perch. Rackauckas' office 
objected each time, and C45 remained comparatively idle while cases piled up in 
other already-overloaded courtrooms. There was no mistaking the prosecutorial 
revenge. The office even filed an objection to Goethals in a case 2 months and 
one day before he'd even gotten the assignment.

The result is 2 needless messes, according to King. First, he believes the 
routine disqualification of Goethals is an attempt "to intimidate, punish 
and/or silence" him for refusing to ignore OCDA, OCSD and Santa Ana police 
cheating. Also, as presiding judge of the county's 17-member felony panel, he 
is tasked with managing the flow of trials akin to "an air-traffic controller 
at a busy airport." The papering game - or, as King labeled it, "judge 
shopping" - has caused "a strain" on the system, with cases languishing 
"unnecessarily." Nowadays, he's refusing to automatically grant Goethals' 
disqualification and told Rackauckas to complain to a California Court of 
Appeal if he doesn't like it.

Kate Corrigan, an ex-OCDA prosecutor who is now a private Newport Beach 
attorney, applauds King's commitment to the "integrity of the judicial system."

Once again, however, prosecutors didn't take the high road. In a Dec. 9 press 
release, Rackauckas shoved Senior Assistant District Attorney Mike Lubinski 
into the hot seat to declare the office's decision to appeal. An analytical 
lawyer deft at maneuvering bureaucratic mazes, Lubinski tried to discredit 
King's "blanket papering" stance with semantics. Don't laugh: It's not 
"blanket" if only 96 % of the cases got moved from Goethals, so the reasoning 
goes.

Lubinski's better argument is found within California law, which allows 
prosecutors to disqualify a judge from a case by simply signing a timely oath 
that the deputy DA has a "good faith belief" that prejudice exists. "The law 
does not require a party to explain his or her reasons for peremptorily 
challenging a judge," he correctly observed.

But King thinks Rackauckas' ham-fisted tactic violates the spirit of the "good 
faith" portion of the disqualifying requirement. Will a state appellate panel 
or the California Supreme Court agree? Unless the legislature takes corrective 
action, some seasoned Southern California lawyers, who are sympathetic, have 
doubts.

There's no mystery, however, about King's resolve against OCDA pressure to yank 
Goethals from the felony panel or all murder trials. "The very thought of this 
option is offensive," he wrote. "To allow a party to manipulate the court into 
removing a judge from hearing certain criminal cases - when that judge, in the 
performance of his judicial duties, has conducted a hearing which exposed that 
same party's misconduct - not only goes against the very cornerstone of our 
society, the rule of law, but would be a concession against judicial 
independence."

King worries that bowing to prosecutorial bullying against Goethals would also 
send a "loud message to other local judges that they could expect similar 
treatment" if they explore future evidence of law-enforcement corruption.

"The situation before this court," he stated, "exemplifies the ability of the 
executive branch to encroach upon or overpower the judiciary - particularly in 
criminal cases."

This, King says, is a "crisis."

(source: Orange County Weekly)






USA:

Death Penalty Opponents Lost Battles In 2015, But They Are Winning The War


On the surface, 2015 was a terrible year for death penalty opponents. Despite a 
series of botched executions, during which inmates were essentially tortured 
inmates due to unreliable drugs used in the execution process, the Supreme 
Court rejected an attempt to place safeguards on these state-sponsored killings 
to ensure that they do not leave the inmate in agony. In the process, the Court 
gave states broad immunity to lawsuits claiming that their execution protocols 
are too cruel to continue.

Even as the Court's conservative majority placed the death penalty on a legal 
pedestal, however, its actual use has withered. As a new report by the Death 
Penalty Information Center (DPIC) explains, only 6 states performed executions 
in 2015, killing a total of 28 people. That's down more than 70 % from 1999, 
when annual executions peaked at 98.

This drop in executions might be explained by uncertainty hanging over whether 
the Supreme Court would declare many executions unconstitutional in Glossip v. 
Gross, the decision that ultimately bolstered the penalty's legal status. But 
the number of death row inmates killed by the states did not simply decline in 
2015 - so did the number of people added to death row. According to the DPIC 
report, "there were 49 death sentences in 2015, 33% below the modern death 
penalty low set last year."

This report built on other data showing that the death penalty is in decline 
and is generally only used by a small number of jurisdictions. More than 
one-third of all U.S. executions take place in a single state, Texas. A study 
of death sentences from 2004-2009 determined that only 10 % of counties within 
the United States produced a single death sentence, and only 1 % of counties 
produced more than 1 such sentence. The death penalty, in other words, has 
become the province of outlier jurisdictions and is never meted out in the bulk 
of the nation.

As the death penalty grows more and more uncommon, that has profound 
constitutional implications. The Eighth Amendment forbids "cruel and unusual 
punishments," or, as Chief Justice Earl Warren once explained, it prohibits 
punishments that cannot be squared with "evolving standards of decency that 
mark the progress of a maturing society." Our standards are evolving, and they 
are rapidly evolving away from the increasingly unusual practice of executions.

For the moment, it's unlikely that our increasing refusal to execute people 
will move a majority of the Supreme Court. Justice Samuel Alito's majority 
opinion in Glossip effectively gave the death penalty super-legal status. "Our 
decisions in this area have been animated in part by the recognition that 
because it is settled that capital punishment is constitutional," he wrote, 
adding that '"[i]t necessarily follows that there must be a [constitutional] 
means of carrying it out.'"

Alito, in other words, started with the premise that the death penalty is 
constitutional, then worked backwards to conclude that there must be a way to 
carry it out - even when the method on the table may lead to people being 
tortured to death. That's not an easy approach to square with the 
Constitution's text. And it's unlikely that a justice who would sign onto this 
reasoning would also sign onto an opinion striking down the death penalty in 
its entirety.

The times could be changing very soon at the Supreme Court, however. As many as 
4 justices could retire in the next president's 1st term. If that president is 
not inclined to put more Alitos on the Supreme Court, the death penalty could 
be declared cruel and unusual.

(source: thinkprogress.org)