Atkins Vs. Virgini Case Study

Mandeeppal Multani (JOHN)
Professor Bernadette p. Mcpherson
COR 201.07 Atkins v. Virginia
Citation: 536 U.S. 304 (2002)
Facts of the Case: On August 16, 1996, after a day of drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana, 18 year old Daryl Atkins and friend William Jones walked to a convenience store and abducted Eric Nesbitt, an airman from the nearby Langley Air Force Base. When abducted Eric Nesbitt, had 60 dollars in his wallet, Atkins then drove Nesbitt in his vehicle, pickup truck, to a nearby ATM forcing him to make a $200 withdraw. Cameras recorded the transaction. Then Atkins and Williams drove Nesbitt to an isolated location and killed him by shooting him eight times with a semiautomatic handgun. After be captured by the local authorities, convicted of abduction, armed robbery, and capital murder, Daryl Atkins was sentenced to death. Important to note is that according to Dr. Even Nelson, a forensic psychologist, Atkins is mildly mentally retarded. This finding of the psychologist was concluded from an interview with Atkins and others who knew him,
along with review of school records, court records of other crimes, and a standard intelligence test indicated that Atkins had a full scale IQ of 59.
Issue: The legal issue at place is a question whether under the Eighth Amendment it is legal to perform capital punishment of a so judged ‘mildly mentally retarded’ convict cruel and unusual? The Eighth Amendment succinctly prohibits “excessive” sanctions. It maintains that no excessiveness in bail, fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments are inflicted on persons convicted of any crimes under the law. Therefore, Daryl Atkins, if, in fact, mentally retarded should have has protections from the death penalty within his constitutional rights.
Decisions: In fact, it is correct that under the Eighth Amendment, capital punishment of a mildly mentally retarded convict, IQ 59, is cruel and unusual punishment. Justice Stevens supplied the opinion of the Court which he noted that mentally underdeveloped persons should be tried and punished for commit crimes only once they meet the law’s requirement of sound mind and body. Areas of disabilities in judgment, reasoning, and control of impulses will hinder their abilities to act with the same moral level of sound mind and body criminals. Hence, this must be considered when judging their conduct. Furthermore, wrongly sentencing and performing capital punishment on such individuals will jeopardize the reliability of fairness in capital punishment proceeding.
Reasoning: The jury sentenced Atkins to death, but the Virginia Supreme Court ordered a second hearing because the trial court used misleading verdict formate.
The court previously establish that the death penalty was inappropriate for the crime of rape in Coker v. Georgia, 433 U.S. 584 (1977), or for those convicted of felony murder who neither themselves killed, attempted to kill, or intended to kill in Enmund v. Florida, 458 U.S. 782 (1982). The Court found that the Eighth Amendment forbids the imposition of the death penalty in these cases because legislatures had recently addressed the matter have rejected the death penalty for these offenders. Moreover, the Court defer the judgments of those bodies. The court ruled 6-3 that executing mentally retarded individuals violates the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishments, but states can define who is mentally
retarded.
Separate Opinions: In an additional opposing opinion, Dr. Stanton Samenow, expressed that Atkins was not mentally retarded, rather he was of typical intelligence but with antisocial personality disorder. Dissenting voices came from Justice Hassell and Justice Koontz. They rejected Dr. Samenow’s opinion as incredulous and came to the conclusion that imposing the death sentence on upon a defendant with the mental age of a 9-16-year-old child is indefensible. Simply put individuals who are mentally underdeveloped are not to some degree less culpable for their criminal acts, just less aware often of the level of impact of their actions. Nevertheless, national consensus is not clear on the issue.
Analysis: I agree with the court’s ruling upholding the Eight Amendment that it is cruel and unusual punishment for someone to get the death penalty if they are, in fact, mentally retarded. Life as mentally retarded should not entail being insane or having brain damage as its meaning. Mental retardation is a condition of impaired or incomplete mental growth. Mentally retarded people have an IQ below 70 while the average person has an IQ of 100. Mentally challenged persons are akin to small children in the body of an adult, and the legal system executes them for crimes that they cannot comprehend or understand what they did. This is cruel and unusual punishment and violates Constitution rights. Mentally retarded people should not be given the death penalty because of their brain capacity to understand what they did. A retarded person is simply not the same as a regular adult, because they have difficulties with communication, language, logic, learning, foresight, strategic thinking, planning, and understanding consequences. So here we have an 18-year-old kid who did something he had no idea what the consequences or long term impact would entail. We should all have protection under the constitution.