Cite as: 504 U. S. 719 (1992)
Scalia, J., dissenting
if the defendant is found guilty of a capital offense, that judge is refusing in advance to follow the statutory direction to consider that evidence and should disqualify himself or herself. Any juror to whom mitigating factors are likewise irrelevant should be disqualified for cause, for that juror has formed an opinion concerning the merits of the case without basis in the evidence developed at trial. Accordingly, the defendant in this case was entitled to have the inquiry made that he proposed to the trial judge.
IV
Because the "inadequacy of voir dire" leads us to doubt that petitioner was sentenced to death by a jury empaneled in compliance with the Fourteenth Amendment, his sentence cannot stand.11 Turner v. Murray, 476 U. S., at 37. Accordingly, the judgment of the Illinois Supreme Court affirming petitioner's death sentence is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
So ordered.
Justice Scalia, with whom The Chief Justice and Justice Thomas join, dissenting.
The Court today holds that a juror who will always impose the death penalty for capital murder is not "impartial" in the sense required by the Sixth Amendment; that the Constitution requires that voir dire directed to this specific "bias" be provided upon the defendant's request; and that the more general questions about "fairness" and ability to "follow the law" that were asked during voir dire in this case were inadequate. Because these conclusions seem to me jointly and severally wrong, I dissent.
11 Our decision today has no bearing on the validity of petitioner's conviction. Witherspoon, 391 U. S., at 523, n. 21.
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