during a shoot out with police, the defendant killed one officer, wounded a second, and narrowly missed a third
How later courts described this case
- during a shoot out with police, the defendant killed one officer, wounded a second, and narrowly missed a third
- requiring proof of criminal conviction to rebut analogous mitigating factor under Alabama statute
- juror is competent if he can lay aside any bias or prejudice and render verdict solely on the evidence presented and the court's instructions
- victim was raped, strangled, stabbed in the neck and shot twice; Court specifically notes victim's intense mental, as well as physical, pain during the ordeal
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Justice Brennan and Justice Marshall,
dissenting.
Adhering to our views that the death penalty is in all circumstances cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U. S. 153, 227, 231 (1976), we would grant certiorari and vacate the death sentences in these cases.