Death is Different

Death is Different

PEOPLE V. LAVALLE , 3 N.Y.3d 88, 817 N.E.2d 341, 783 N.Y.S.2d 485

Decided June 24, 2004

More than 200 years after Marbury v. Madison, judicial review remains a controversial matter. The controversy is most intense when it involves the court overturning contentious and emotional policies like the death penalty.

In this case, Stephen LaValle was given the death penalty for raping and murdering Cynthia Quinn on May 31, 1997. Quinn was jogging near her home in Yaphank, New York early that morning when she came upon LaValle urinating by the side of the road. LaValle became angry when Quinn yelled at him and he followed her into the woods, raped her and stabbed her 73 times with a screwdriver that he took away from her. LaValle was arrested two days later. DNA samples taken from Quinn’s body and clothing matched LaValle. He was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death under New York State’s death penalty law.

After conviction and before sentencing, the jury was given the following instruction (a so-called deadlock instruction) as required by New York’s death penalty law: “[I]n the event the jury fails to reach unanimous agreement with respect to the sentence, the court will sentence the defendant to a term of imprisonment with a minimum term of between twenty and twenty -five years and a maximum term of life.” The jury sentenced LaValle to death. The issue on appeal to the New York State Court of Appeals was whether the deadlock instruction, which raises the possibility that a person like LaValle might be released after twenty years or less (with parole), unconstitutionally coerced jurors to agree to the death penalty.

In a 4-3 decision, the New York State Court of Appeals invalidated New York’s death penalty and LaValle’s death sentence.[1] It held the instruction unconstitutional under the New York State Constitution’s Due Process Clause “because of the unacceptable risk that it may result in a coercive, and thus arbitrary and unreliable sentence.” The Court believed that the deadlock instruction would make the jurors fear that if they do not reach unanimity, the defendant may be paroled in 20 years and pose a threat to society in the future. “By interjecting future dangerousness, the deadlock instruction gives rise to an unconstitutionally palpable risk that one or more jurors who cannot bear the thought that a defendant may walk the streets again after serving 20 to 25 years will join jurors favoring death in order to avoid the deadlock sentence.”

The decision explained that the goal of any jury instruction is to encourage unanimity while promoting reliability. This can be a delicate balance. If the jury fails to reach a unanimous agreement, the system has failed.[2] At the same time, New York State law requires that the death sentence be based on a determination that death as a punishment fits the crime, not on defendant’s future dangerousness or fear that he/she may be parole-eligible. “Death is qualitatively different” from other forms of punishment and therefore there is a greater need for reliability in the determination that death is the appropriate punishment in a specific case.

Although the United States Supreme Court has never considered a deadlock instruction like New York’s under the U.S. Constitution, in Jones v. United States (527 U.S. 373) it held that the U.S. Constitution does not require the jury to be instructed about the consequences of their failure to agree. So long as the jury instruction is accurate it need not be balanced. The New York State Court of Appeals decided that New York’s Constitution is more protective of due process than the United States Constitution in this instance and requires a “heightened standard of reliability” in death penalty sentencing. The LaValle court held that the New York State Constitution requires jurors to be instructed about the consequences of their failure to agree and the instruction must be balanced and non-coercive.

Learning Activities

Terms to Know

The dissent in LaValle wrote that the Court of Appeals was substituting its own preference against the death penalty for the Legislature’s preference for the death penalty in an unjust exercise of judicial review. A concurring opinion by Justice Albert Rosenblatt addressed the dissent directly:

“While cogent, the dissent goes too far in asserting repeatedly that the Court is substituting its own preference for the Legislature’s....Just as judges should not shrink from carrying out legislative will, so too should they not shrink from declaring statutes unconstitutional in proper cases, however distasteful that may be. In both instances, criticism (and occasionally, cynicism) is inevitable.”

What did Justice Rosenblatt mean in the last sentence above? How does the power of judicial review articulated in Marbury v. Madison (5 U.S. 137 (1803)) interfere with democracy? How does it safeguard democracy?

In his last sentence, Rosenblatt meant criticism like “the court did not have the stomach to declare the death penalty unconstitutional” or “the court did not have the stomach to carry out the death penalty” is inevitable. In his last sentence, Rosenblatt meant cynicism like the perception that the majority of the judges are personally opposed to the death penalty and so will find any and every excuse to invalidate it and the will of the people as expressed through their representatives in the legislature. Democracy is self-government. Legislators are elected by the people and judges on the Court of Appeals are not. Giving power to these judges (as well as federal court judges who are not elected) who can thwart the will of the majority as expressed by the Legislature. At the same time, democracy must be safeguarded by the courts from the “tyranny of the majority.”

In LaValle, the Court also held that the absence of a jury instruction regarding the consequences of failure to reach unanimity (deadlock instruction) would be unconstitutional under the New York State Constitution, although not the United States Constitution. The Court believed that silence on the matter would lead to speculation by the jurors and cited studies indicating that this would lead to fear on the part of the jurors that deadlock would lead to defendant’s release, retrial or sentence to a lesser term. This Learning Activity will engage students in testing this theory. It might work best if done after reading the second paragraph of the summary containing the case’s facts, but before reading the entire summary containing the Court’s decision.

Divide your class into three groups, each acting as a sentencing jury of LaValle, who was convicted of the murder described in the summary. Be sure to have at least one person in each group who seems to oppose the death penalty in principle and at least one person in each group who seems to support the death penalty in principle. If there is no one you can identify for those roles, “plant” someone there. Also, have 3-4 students be “observers” to roam among the groups to hear their discussions.

All groups have the choice of two sentences, life without the possibility of parole or death. Each group must decide on the sentence given its respective deadlock instruction:

Group 2: A deadlock instruction that explains that the judge can sentence defendant to 20-25 years or life without parole, but not death, if the jurors fail to unanimously agree to a sentence.

Group 3: A deadlock instruction that explains that the judge can sentence defendant to life without parole, but not death, if the jurors fail to unanimously agree to a sentence.

Have each group deliberate and announce its decision and how it was reached. Ask the “observers” to report on their observations. Finally, ask the students to select the best deadlock instruction or come up with a better deadlock instruction. This is what the New York Legislature must do if it wishes to have a death penalty in our state.

The process should show how coercion becomes a factor in reaching decisions on a jury and what role, if any, the deadlock instruction plays. It may show that anti-death students are coerced to support death and/or pro-death students are coerced to support life without parole in order to avoid a deadlock. It may show how speculation comes into play. Also, be sure to remind students in the end that the deadlock instruction with which groups 1 and 2 worked are now unconstitutional in New York. Group 3's instruction is a possibility, although the danger is that jurors who oppose a death sentence would have no incentive to compromise since if the jury fails to agree, the judge will impose their choice. This may come out in Group 3's deliberations.

The attorneys arguments before the Court of Appeals in this case can be viewed as a webcast from the Court of Appeals site found at www.courts.state.ny.us/ctapps/

[1] The Court found the existing jury instruction to be unconstitutional but that there must be a jury instruction regarding the consequences of failing to agree. The Court said, “We cannot, however, ourselves craft a new instruction, because to do so would usurp legislative prerogative.” It, therefore, declared the entire death penalty statute unconstitutional.

[2] If a unanimous verdict is not reached in a criminal case involving a defendant’s guilt or innocence, the jury is “hung” and the defendant is not convicted. In crimes involving capital punishment, a unanimous verdict on guilt must be reached and then a unanimous verdict on a death sentence must be reached. If there is no unanimity on a death sentence, there is no mistrial – the judge decides the sentence, although he/she cannot sentence the defendant to death.