Cite as: 506 U. S. 390 (1993)
O'Connor, J., concurring
far short of that which would have to be made in order to trigger the sort of constitutional claim which we have assumed, arguendo, to exist.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Affirmed.
Justice O'Connor, with whom Justice Kennedy joins, concurring.
I cannot disagree with the fundamental legal principle that executing the innocent is inconsistent with the Constitution. Regardless of the verbal formula employed—"contrary to contemporary standards of decency," post, at 430 (dissenting opinion) (relying on Ford v. Wainwright, 477 U. S. 399, 406 (1986)), "shocking to the conscience," post, at 430 (relying on Rochin v. California, 342 U. S. 165, 172 (1952)), or offensive to a " ' "principle of justice so rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as fundamental," ' " ante, at 407-408 (opinion of the Court) (quoting Medina v. California, 505 U. S. 437, 445-446 (1992), in turn quoting Patterson v. New York, 432 U. S. 197, 202 (1977))—the execution of a legally and factually innocent person would be a constitutionally intolerable event. Dispositive to this case, however, is an equally fundamental fact: Petitioner is not innocent, in any sense of the word.
As the Court explains, ante, at 398-400, petitioner is not innocent in the eyes of the law because, in our system of justice, "the trial is the paramount event for determining the guilt or innocence of the defendant," ante, at 416. Accord, post, at 441 (dissenting opinion). In petitioner's case, that paramount event occurred 10 years ago. He was tried before a jury of his peers, with the full panoply of protections that our Constitution affords criminal defendants. At the conclusion of that trial, the jury found petitioner guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Petitioner therefore does not appear before us as an innocent man on the verge of execution. He is instead a legally guilty one who, refusing to accept
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