Robert L. Ayers, JR., Acting Warden v. Fernando Belmontes (549 U.S. 7)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided October 13, 2006 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 549 U.S. 7 · 127 S. Ct. 469
- Decided
- October 13, 2006
- Term
- October Term 2006
- Vote
- 5–4
- Majority author
- Justice Kennedy
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. Fernando Belmontes, the respondent here, was tried in 1982 in the Superior Court of the State of California in and for the County of San Joaquin. A jury returned a verdict of murder in the first degree and then determined he should be sentenced to death. The issue before us concerns a jury instruction in the sentencing phase. The trial court, following the statute then in effect, directed the jury, with other instructions and in a context to be discussed in more detail, to consider certain specific factors either as aggravating or mitigating. The trial court further instructed the jury to consider “[a]ny other circumstance which extenuates the gravity of the crime even though it is not a legal excuse for the crime.” App. 184. Under the then-applicable statutory scheme this general or catchall factor was codified at Cal. Penal Code Ann. § 190.3(k) (West 1988); and it is referred to as “factor (k).” Belmontes contended, on direct review, in state collateral proceedings, and in the federal habeas proceedings giving rise to this case, that factor (k) and the trial court’s other instructions barred the jury from considering his forward-looking mitigation evidence — specifically evidence that he likely would lead a constructive life if incarcerated instead of executed. The alleged limitation, in his view, prevented the jury from…
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