38
Syllabus
into play, a stage at which South Carolina law provides no third choice, no 30-year mandatory minimum, just death or life without parole. See Ramdass v. Angelone, 530 U. S. 156, 169. Thus, whenever future dangerousness is at issue in a capital sentencing proceeding under South Carolina's new scheme, due process requires that the jury be informed that a life sentence carries no possibility of parole. Pp. 48-51.
2. South Carolina's other grounds in support of the trial judge's refusal to give Shafer's requested parole ineligibility instruction are unavailing. Pp. 52-55.
(a) The State's argument that the jury was properly informed of the law on parole ineligibility by the trial court's instructions and by defense counsel's own argument is unpersuasive. To support that contention, the State sets out defense counsel's closing pleas that, if Shafer's life is spared, he will die in prison after spending his natural life there, as well as passages from the trial judge's instructions reiterating that life imprisonment means until the death of the defendant. Displacement of the longstanding practice of parole availability remains a relatively recent development, and common sense indicates that many jurors might not know whether a life sentence carries with it the possibility of parole. Simmons, 512 U. S., at 177-178 (O'Connor, J., concurring in judgment). Indeed, until two years before Shafer's trial, South Carolina's law did not categorically preclude parole for capital defendants sentenced to life imprisonment. Most plainly contradicting the State's contention, the jury's written request for further instructions on the question left no doubt about the jury's failure to gain from defense counsel's closing argument or the judge's instructions any clear understanding of what a life sentence means. Cf., e. g., id., at 178. The jury's comprehension was hardly aided by the court's final instruction declaring that parole eligibility was not for the jury's consideration. That instruction did nothing to ensure that the jury was not misled and may well have been taken to mean that parole was available but that the jury, for some unstated reason, should be blind to this fact. E. g., id., at 170 (plurality opinion). Thus, although a life sentence for Shafer would permit no parole or other release under current state law, this reality was not conveyed to Shafer's jury by the court's instructions or by the arguments defense counsel was allowed to make. Pp. 52-54.
(b) The State's contention that no parole ineligibility instruction was required under Simmons because the State never argued that Shafer would pose a future danger to society presents an issue that is not ripe for this Court's resolution. The State Supreme Court, in order to rule broadly that Simmons no longer governs capital sentencing in the State, apparently assumed, arguendo, that future dangerousness had been shown at Shafer's sentencing proceeding. Because that court did
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