Many states have a requirement that the penalty phase jury must be unanimous. In some, including California and Arizona, that means that if the jury cannot reach unanimous agreement, at least on the first attempt, a mistrial is declared and a new jury is formed. In others, deadlock means the defendant gets a life sentence, even if that means the view of one juror has prevailed over the views of the other eleven.
I have noted many times on this blog that I think the "single juror veto" system is nuts, and states that have it should get rid of it. Yet legislation being considered in Florida would actually go the opposite direction, adopting this system in a state that does not presently have it.
It is all well and good for the Florida Legislature to tweak that state's system to eliminate any doubt that it complies with the Supreme Court's 2002 decision in Ring v. Arizona, an issue the high court has taken up in Hurst v. Florida. See this post. But there is no reason to adopt single-juror veto of the ultimate penalty decision in the process.
I have noted many times on this blog that I think the "single juror veto" system is nuts, and states that have it should get rid of it. Yet legislation being considered in Florida would actually go the opposite direction, adopting this system in a state that does not presently have it.
It is all well and good for the Florida Legislature to tweak that state's system to eliminate any doubt that it complies with the Supreme Court's 2002 decision in Ring v. Arizona, an issue the high court has taken up in Hurst v. Florida. See this post. But there is no reason to adopt single-juror veto of the ultimate penalty decision in the process.
At present, Florida juries make a sentencing recommendation to the judge based on whether the aggravating circumstances, taken from and limited to a defined list, are outweighed by mitigating circumstances, including a "catch all" circumstance that lets the defendant bring in everything including the kitchen sink. The jury need not be unanimous and can make a recommendation of death by a majority vote. A 6-6 split means a recommendation of life in prison, which the judge could override in theory but never does.
In the process of making the findings needed for recommendation of death, the jury would necessarily have to find at least one aggravating circumstance, since there are always some mitigating circumstances and anything necessarily outweighs nothing. For this reason, I believe that the present Florida system does comply with Ring, given the holding of Apodaca v. Oregon that juries need not be unanimous.
Even so, breaking out the aggravating circumstance finding, making it explicit, and making it unanimous would be a good idea. It's better to get this finding on the record. Since most of the circumstances are objective facts (e.g., victim under 12 years old) achieving unanimity on at least one is not all that hard in a typical capital case. Plus we never know when the high court might change its mind and overrule Apodaca. This change is all that is required to put to rest any doubt of compliance with Ring.
For the actual sentencing recommendation, Florida has a good system. In the earthy wisdom of the auto mechanic, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."
SB 664 would say that the jury has to be unanimous in its recommendation but does not say explicitly what happens if it is not. The similar federal law was interpreted by the Supreme Court to adopt a single-juror veto system. One juror can simply hold out, refuse to deliberate, refuse to give any reason for his "no" vote, and sit in the corner until the eleven others give up. This is what we see in federal prosecutions. That is what we saw in the Jodi Arias retrial because Arizona has the single-juror veto for retrials but not initial trials.
So what does the committee analysis for SB 664 say about this? Its only source is the American Bar Association, an organization that uniformly takes the defense side in criminal matters whenever it takes a stand and which does everything it can to hinder the death penalty. The analysis says the ABA report "suggests that 'requiring unanimity...promotes a thorough and reasoned resolution.' "
That would be true if the law required unanimity either way, but to say that single-juror veto "promotes a thorough and reasoned resolution" defies both experience and logic. It does exactly the opposite.
Let's hope the Florida Legislature sees through this nonsense. Although the bill was on the committee agenda today, it is listed as "not considered."
In the process of making the findings needed for recommendation of death, the jury would necessarily have to find at least one aggravating circumstance, since there are always some mitigating circumstances and anything necessarily outweighs nothing. For this reason, I believe that the present Florida system does comply with Ring, given the holding of Apodaca v. Oregon that juries need not be unanimous.
Even so, breaking out the aggravating circumstance finding, making it explicit, and making it unanimous would be a good idea. It's better to get this finding on the record. Since most of the circumstances are objective facts (e.g., victim under 12 years old) achieving unanimity on at least one is not all that hard in a typical capital case. Plus we never know when the high court might change its mind and overrule Apodaca. This change is all that is required to put to rest any doubt of compliance with Ring.
For the actual sentencing recommendation, Florida has a good system. In the earthy wisdom of the auto mechanic, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."
SB 664 would say that the jury has to be unanimous in its recommendation but does not say explicitly what happens if it is not. The similar federal law was interpreted by the Supreme Court to adopt a single-juror veto system. One juror can simply hold out, refuse to deliberate, refuse to give any reason for his "no" vote, and sit in the corner until the eleven others give up. This is what we see in federal prosecutions. That is what we saw in the Jodi Arias retrial because Arizona has the single-juror veto for retrials but not initial trials.
So what does the committee analysis for SB 664 say about this? Its only source is the American Bar Association, an organization that uniformly takes the defense side in criminal matters whenever it takes a stand and which does everything it can to hinder the death penalty. The analysis says the ABA report "suggests that 'requiring unanimity...promotes a thorough and reasoned resolution.' "
That would be true if the law required unanimity either way, but to say that single-juror veto "promotes a thorough and reasoned resolution" defies both experience and logic. It does exactly the opposite.
Let's hope the Florida Legislature sees through this nonsense. Although the bill was on the committee agenda today, it is listed as "not considered."
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