explaining that a conviction may be reversed based on the exclusion of evidence where there is either a clear error by the trial court in its evidentiary rulings or “compelling reasons for exceptions” to the rules of evidence
How later courts described this case
- explaining that a conviction may be reversed based on the exclusion of evidence where there is either a clear error by the trial court in its evidentiary rulings or “compelling reasons for exceptions” to the rules of evidence
- noting that “[bjecause of the state of the law in Florida at the time of Knight’s trial, defense attorneys could not anticipate the conflict between the not yet decided Lockett decision and Florida’s law limiting a jury’s consideration of nonstatutory mitigating evidence”
- noting that a conviction must be reversed where there is "either clear error by the trial courts in their evidentiary rulings or compelling reasons for exceptions to state evidentiary or procedural rules”
- reasoning counsel may not be faulted for not presenting mitigating evidence after he investigated options, but defendant refused to permit presentation
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
TJOFLAT, Circuit Judge,
specially concurring:
I concur in the court’s judgment. I write separately merely to comment on the respondent’s argument that we should treat petitioner’s Lockett claim as procedurally barred.
This is a pre-Lockett case, in that petitioner was tried and sentenced before the Supreme Court decided Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U.S. 586 , 98 S.Ct. 2954 , 57 L.Ed.2d 973 (1978). In pre-Lockett cases, as I noted in Hargrave v. Dugger, 832 F.2d 1528, 1539 (11th Cir.1987) (en banc) (Tjoflat, J., specially concurring), the Florida courts do not *759 apply their procedural default rules to bar review of Lockett claims. We are therefore obliged to review petitioner’s Lockett claim without requiring him to demonstrate cause for his state court procedural default. Id.