Supreme Court rejects use of 'racial stereotypes' in death penalty cases

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument on October 5 in Buck v. Davis, a Texas case in which Duane Buck was sentenced to death after his own lawyer presented expert testimony from a psychologist who called Buck more likely to commit acts of violence in the future because he is Black.

Story by LA Times
Written by David Savage

Link to Davis and Buck Supreme Court case: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-8049_f2ah.pdf

The Supreme Court rejected the use of "racial stereotypes" in death penalty cases Wednesday, reopening the case of a black man in Texas who was sentenced to die after his jury was told African Americans are more likely than whites to commit crimes.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said this testimony had no place in a sentencing hearing and "appealed to the racial stereotype that black men are prone to violence."

"Our laws punish people for what they do, not for who they are," the chief justice said in the courtroom.

The 6-2 decision faults Texas authorities for refusing to give a new sentencing hearing to Duane Buck, a Houston man who was convicted of shooting and killing his ex-girlfriend and seriously injuring her new boyfriend in 1995.

Buck was found guilty of murder, but when his jury was debating his fate, his court-appointed defense attorney put on the witness stand an expert who cited statistics showing blacks are more likely to commit future crimes than whites.

After hearing this testimony, the jury decided to sentence Buck to death.

Years later, Texas state attorneys set aside the death sentences for six other black defendants whose juries heard similar testimony, but they refused to reopen Buck's case.

In Buck vs. Davis, the high court said that was a mistake. The jury was deciding "the question of life or death," and this is no place for the introduction of a "particularly noxious strain of racial prejudice," Roberts said.

The court sent the case back to judges in Texas to reconsider the death sentence.

Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, along with Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.

Thomas said Buck was properly sentenced to die for a brutal murder, and he insisted the court should not have heard the case for procedural reasons. "Having settled on a desired outcome, the court bulldozes procedural obstacles and misapplies settled law to justify it," he wrote.