Paul Palalaua Tuilaepa v. California (512 U.S. 967)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 30, 1994 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 512 U.S. 967 · 114 S. Ct. 2630
- Decided
- June 30, 1994
- Term
- October Term 1993
- Vote
- 8–1
- Majority author
- Justice Kennedy
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. In California, to sentence a defendant to death for first-degree murder the trier of fact must find the defendant guilty , and also find one or more of 19 special circumstances listed in Cal. Penal Code Ann. § 190.2 (West 1988 and Supp. 1994). The case then proceeds to the penalty phase, where the trier of fact must consider a number of specified factors in deciding whether to sentence the defendant to death. §190.3. These two cases present the question whether three of the §190.3 penalty-phase factors are unconstitutionally vague under decisions of this Court construing the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause of the Eighth Amendment, made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. I Petitioner Tuilaepa’s case arises out of a murder he committed in Long Beach, California, in October 1986. Tuilaepa and an accomplice walked into the Wander Inn Bar in Long Beach, where a small crowd had gathered to watch Monday Night Football. Tuilaepa, who was carrying a .22-caliber rifle, approached the bartender, pointed the rifle at him, and demanded money from the cash register. After the bartender turned over the money, Tuilaepa and his accomplice began robbing the bar’s patrons. When the accomplice demanded money from a man named Melvin Whiddon, Whiddon refused and knocked the accomplice to the floor. Tuilaepa shot Whiddon in…
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