AND Georgia House On Tuesday, he adopted a proposal for the Law on the Decrease of the Prague that a person faced with a death penalty that is considered intellectually disabled, which would make them inappropriate for the death penalty.
State Ambassador Bill Werkheiser, a Republican, had previously had introduced legislation Focused to make it easier for someone to proof that it is intellectually disabled to avoid the death penalty in Peach, which has one of the most severe thresholds of the nation to overcome.
This proposal was proposed only a few months before Willie James Pye, whose IQ was reportedly low enough to show that he was intellectually disabled, executed after being convicted in rape in 1993 and shot his ex -girlfriend’s death, Alicia Lynn Yarbrough. Pyeo’s lawyers claimed that he was intellectually disabled and damaged by the brain.
The execution of Pyea was bothered by Werkheiser, whose time of legal legislation never voted on the Committee, but this proposal of the law received more legislative support after the home was unanimous. Now he is referred to the Senate.
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Georgia GOP Ambassador Bill Werkheiser said he thought it was “duties” that the state “protects those who cannot protect themselves.” (AP)
Georgia became the first state to ban the death sentence for intellectually disabled people in 1988. The Supreme Court of the United States later followed the lawsuit and ruled in 2002 that the execution of intellectually disabled people violated constitutional protection against cruel and unusual penalties.
However, the court allowed the states to determine the threshold that the person is considered intellectually disabled. Georgia requires people to prove intellectual disability out of reasonable doubt, making it the only state with such a high burden of evidence.
The proposal of the law also enables the defendants to present evidence of intellectual disability at a pre -pre -pre -prevention hearing that would be mandatory if prosecutors agree. If they were convicted of trial, the accused could then present evidence of intellectual disability in a separate process before the same jury.
Accused of which are found to have an intellectual disability, they would get a a a lifelong punishment if convicted.
“I believe the state is obliged to protect those who cannot protect themselves,” Werkheiser said.
In the second case, Warren Lee Hill was executed in Georgia in 2015 for killing detainees, despite his lawyers claiming he had an intellectual disability. In 2002, the judge said that Georgia would use a lower standard than a reasonable doubt, Hill would probably be intellectually disabled.
The Georgia House unanimously made a proposal to reduce the threshold that the person who faces the death penalty is considered intellectually disabled, making them inappropriate for execution. (AP Photo/sue huge, file)
When the Georgia Supreme Court supported the death sentence for Rodney Young in 2021, the judges found that he had not been able to prove beyond reasonable suspicion that he was intellectually disabled, although the then preslication of justice David Nahmias wrote that he would “accept” legislative efforts to lower the bow.
Young was sentenced to death in killing Gary Jones 2008, an adult son of his former fiancé.
Prosecutors testified at the hearing of the Committee not to oppose the amendments to the standard of a reasonable doubt, but they are against changes in the trial process and adding a pre -pre -prevailing hearing.
“The proposed Bill Cherry-Picks from several different countries,” said T. Wright Barksdale III, the Ocmulgee Ocmulgee District Prosecutor in central Georgia.
The proponents of the law claim that if the jurors have already heard the details of a terrible crime, they may have a difficult time of assessing evidence of the intellectual disability of the defendant without bias.
Most countries allow the defendants the opportunity to prove their intellectual disability before the trial and have separate processes to determine the guilt of the defendant and to determine their intellectual disability.
“Changing only the standard of evidence is not enough to ensure that Georgia does not continue to execute people with valid claims about intellectual disability,” said Mazie Lynn Guertin, the CEO of Criminal Defense Association Georgia.
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Justices of the Georgia Supreme Court found that Rodney Young, a man sentenced to a death sentence, failed to prove beyond a reasonable suspicion that he was intellectually disabled and supported his death sentence. (Ben Gray/Atlanta Journal-Conystitution via AP)
BARKSDALE claims that the proposal would make the proceedings too complicated and prevent the death sentence at all.
“As this law is constructed and based on my experience of trying out capital cases, this would, for all intentions and purposes, be solving us to the point that we would never have a real fair shooting when you have ever received a death sentence for anyone,” Barksdale said, adding that the legislators should abolish the sentence of death if what is their main deputy.
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During the two hearing of the Committee on this proposal, Republican and democratic legislators seemed unconvincing that procedural changes would make the procedure too complicated. Cases of death penalty have noted, for a long time, including many proposals and hearing ahead of the trial.
“We have a death penalty in this country. I will not discuss it,” the Democratic envoy Esther Panith, who is also a lawyer for criminal defense, said on Tuesday. “But if we are going to single out the ultimate punishment, it should only be the worst of the worst and those we spent time to make sure we will understand their guilt.”
Associated Press contributed to this report.
