172
Stevens, J., dissenting
a criminal proceeding that they are excepted from Teague's nonretroactivity principle.
The majority appears not to appreciate that the reason Simmons' holding applied directly to only a narrow class of capital defendants is because only a very few States had in place procedures that allowed the prosecutor to argue future dangerousness while at the same time prohibiting defendants from using "the only way that [they] can successfully rebut the State's case." 512 U. S., at 177 (O’Connor, J., concurring in judgment).5 The prevailing rule in the States that provided a life-without-parole sentencing alternative required an instruction explaining that alternative to the jury.6
Although the majority relies on the limited impact of the Simmons rule to discount its importance, the broad consensus in favor of giving the jury accurate information in fact underscores the importance of the rule applied in Simmons. The rule's significance is further demonstrated by evidence of the effect that information about the life-without-parole alternative has on capital jury deliberations. For example, only 2 death sentences have been imposed in Virginia for crimes committed after January 1, 1995—whereas 10 were imposed in 1994 alone—and the decline in the number of death sentences has been attributed to the fact that juries in Virginia must now be informed of the life-without-parole alternative. See Green, Death Sentences Decline in Virginia, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Nov. 24, 1996,7 p. A1. The
5 See Simmons, 512 U. S., at 168, n. 8.
6 See id., at 167, n. 7 (listing the States whose capital punishment schemes in one way or another require the jury to be informed that life without parole is either the only available alternative sentence or one of the options from which the jury is free to choose).
7 See also, e. g., Comment, Truth in Sentencing: The Prospective and Retroactive Application of Simmons v. South Carolina, 63 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1573 (1996); Eisenberg & Wells, Deadly Confusion: Juror Instructions in Capital Cases, 79 Cornell L. Rev. 1, 7-9 (1993) ("[J]urors who believe the alternative to death is a relatively short time in prison tend to sentence
Page: Index Previous 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007