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Will bad facts doom a double jeopardy claim brought to SCOTUS in capital case?

By Douglas A. Berman

This new article in the Washington Post, headlined "Va. Inmate's Lawyers Argue Double Jeopardy," raises the age-old question of whether bad facts often make for bad law.  Here are the basic details (which read almost as if they created by a screen-writer in Hollywood): Lawyers for a Virginia inmate scheduled to die next week for killing a 16-year-old -- then bragging about it to prosecutors when he thought he couldn't face the death penalty -- are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the execution. Paul Warner Powell's lawyers argue that he was unconstitutionally convicted twice for the 1999 murder and attempted rape of Stacie Reed.   Powell, 31, was convicted in 2000 of killing Reed and raping and trying to kill her 14-year-old relative...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on July 06, 2009 (boomark / email).