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The Mental Retardation Standard in Georgia

By Steve Hall

Today's Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports, "Court asked to find mental retardation burden unconstitutional."  It's written by Bill Rankin. A lawyer for a convicted killer said Georgia should no longer be the only state in the country that sets the highest legal threshold possible for death-penalty defendants who raise mental retardation claims. In arguments on Monday before the state Supreme Court, David Gossett, a lawyer for Alphonso Stripling, said requiring such defendants to do this -- proving mental retardation beyond a reasonable doubt -- is unconstitutional. Because of Georgia's law, "One thing is certain: mentally retarded defendants will be executed," Gossett said. The U.S. Supreme Court prohibited this in a ruling handed down in 2002, he noted...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on March 22, 2011 (boomark / email).