794
Opinion of the Court
ostensibly neutral competency examination of a capital defendant, but drew conclusions from the defendant's un-counseled statements regarding his future dangerousness, and later testified for the prosecution on that crucial issue. We likened the psychiatrist to "an agent of the State recounting unwarned statements made in a postarrest custodial setting," and held that "[a] criminal defendant, who neither initiates a psychiatric evaluation nor attempts to introduce any psychiatric evidence, may not be compelled to respond to a psychiatrist if his statements can be used against him at a capital sentencing proceeding." Id., at 467- 468. The admission of the psychiatrist's testimony under those "distinct circumstances" violated the Fifth Amendment. Id., at 466.
This case differs from Estelle in several respects. First, the defendant in Estelle had not placed his mental condition at issue, id., at 457, n. 1, whereas Penry himself made his mental status a central issue in both the 1977 rape case and his trials for Pamela Carpenter's rape and murder. Second, in Estelle, the trial court had called for the competency evaluation and the State had chosen the examining psychiatrist. Id., at 456-457. Here, however, it was Penry's own counsel in the 1977 case who requested the psychiatric exam performed by Dr. Peebles. Third, in Estelle, the State had called the psychiatrist to testify as a part of its affirmative case. Id., at 459. Here, it was during the cross-examination of Penry's own psychological witness that the prosecutor elicited the quotation from the Peebles report. And fourth, in Estelle, the defendant was charged with a capital crime at the time of his competency exam, and it was thus clear that his future dangerousness would be a specific issue at sentencing. Penry, however, had not yet murdered Pamela Carpenter at the time of his interview with Dr. Peebles.
We need not and do not decide whether these differences affect the merits of Penry's Fifth Amendment claim.
Page: Index Previous 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007