US: The United States Supreme Court yesterday overturned death sentences on at least 150 convicted killers in a ruling that judge-imposed sentences represented a denial of a constitutional right to jury trial.
The 7-2 decision, by an alliance of conservative and liberal members of the court, is the second major reversal of the death penalty in two weeks.
Last week the court ruled against the execution of the mentally retarded.
Yesterday's ruling, arising from an Arizona case, will immediately apply in that state and in Idaho and Montana, where a single judge decides the sentence.
It will also apply immediately in Colorado and Nebraska, where a panel of judges makes the sentencing decision, while the effect of the ruling on states where juries make a recommendation is unclear.
The decision does not impinge on the basic constitutionality of the death penalty.
While the decision was welcomed by civil liberties groups it is seen as less significant for the campaign against the death penalty than last week's - some lawyers say that states may simply put those affected through a re-sentencing process and do not have to limit the scope of application of the death penalty.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing for the majority, said the court's ruling in a case called Apprendi v. New Jersey cannot be reconciled with the death penalty sentencing laws in Arizona, where the judge was allowed, after the dismissal of a jury, to take evidence of aggravating circumstances to determine whether the death penalty should be applied.
The Apprendi case concerned a judge's ability to lengthen a sentence by two years if a crime was determined to be a hate crime. The Supreme Court struck down that sentencing law.
"The right to trial by jury guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment would be senselessly diminished if it encompassed the fact-finding necessary to increase a defendant's sentence by two years, but not the fact-finding necessary to put him to death," Justice Ginsburg wrote. "We hold that the Sixth Amendment applies to both."
"I was essentially given two trials," Timothy Ring, who was been convicted of killing an armoured car driver during a 1994 robbery in Phoenix, told the Associated Press earlier this year. "One before a jury and then one before a judge."
The judge in the case heard testimony at a sentencing hearing from an accomplice who said Ring planned the robbery and murdered the guard.
The judge then determined that the aggravating factors warranted death.
Nationwide, about 3,700 people await execution for crimes committed in the 38 states that allow the death penalty.
