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September 7, 2008 11:32:19 PM CDT

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Justices Stay Execution, Signaling Moratorium

Posted Oct 31, 07 6:30 AM CDT in US 

(Newser) – The Supreme Court delivered an eleventh-hour stay for a prisoner slated to die by lethal injection last night, giving what the New York Times calls a "nearly indisputable indication" that a majority of justices are willing to block all executions until they rule on a death penalty case next spring. Earl Berry had eaten his last meal in a Mississippi jail, and the verdict was delivered 19 minutes before the scheduled execution.

The decision imposes a de facto moratorium on all executions until 2008, the Times concludes, as lower courts will now have to grant stays while the Supreme Court considers the overriding case. At issue is not the constitutionality of the death penalty, but a procedural question of how to evaluate arguments that a lethal injection produces suffering amounting to cruel and unusual punishment.

Sources New York Times, Washington Post

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This Feb. 21, 2001 file photo provided by the Mississippi Department of Corrections shows Mississippi inmate Earl Wesley Berry in Parchman, Miss. The Supreme Court halted an execution in Mississippi Tuesday,...   (Associated Press)
Mississippi Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps, right, listens as Jena Watson, daughter of 1987 kidnapping and murder victim Mary Bounds, gives a statement for the family following the U.S. Supreme Court...   (Associated Press)
Charles Bounds expresses his disappointment to state Department of Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps, right, while expressing his intense disappointment towards the U.S. Supreme Court granting of a...   (Associated Press)
The US Supreme Court in Washington. The Court issued a stay of execution that effectively imposes a moratorium on all executions until spring 2008.   ((c) kjetil_r)
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US Supreme Court  • death penalty  • constitutionality  • moratorium  • Earl Berry


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