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By a 5–1 vote, the Florida Supreme Court overturns a whole line of precedent that limited the death penalty to "the most aggravated and the least mitigated of first-degree murders."
The decision sets back Florida's death penalty jurisprudence by decades. https://www.floridasupremecourt.org/content/download/685153/opinion/sc18-2061.pdf
The decision sets back Florida's death penalty jurisprudence by decades. https://www.floridasupremecourt.org/content/download/685153/opinion/sc18-2061.pdf
This decision is a HUGE deal. The Florida Supreme Court has long reviewed death sentences for proportionality. But five conservative justices just decided they didn't like that rule, so they tossed it out the window. An earthquake in Florida's criminal justice system.
To see the future of our federal judiciary, just take a look at the Florida Supreme Court. Republicans have now stacked it with a 6–1 conservative majority ... which promptly gave itself the power to overturn decades of precedent. A massive power-grab. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/01/florida-supreme-court-precedent-conservatives-death-penalty.html
The Florida Supreme Court's last remaining moderate, Justice Labarga, dissented. He outlined the conservative majority's recent assault on precedent, leading up to today's reversal of a nearly 50-YEAR-OLD decision, with obvious disgust. This is a warning. https://www.floridasupremecourt.org/content/download/685153/opinion/sc18-2061.pdf
