Whether the capital sentencing statute in Texas provides a vehicle for jurors to give effect to mitigation evidence has been a critical factor when the United States Supreme Court has sought to determine its constitutionality. Unlike the majority of other American jurisdictions which maintain capital punishment as a penalty, Texas utilizes a particularly unique scheme which places an assessment of the defendant’s dangerousness at the center of the sentencing decision. Using data gathered from personally conducted interviews with forty-six former capital jurors and trial transcripts from each trial in which they served, this thesis demonstrates how the current sentencing scheme in Texas fails to provide jurors with an adequate vehicle for considering mitigation evidence. Beginning with an analysis of the process of jury selection this study examines the various ways in which the sentencing scheme is explained to potential jurors by the judge, prosecution, and defense attorneys. Of crucial importance is how the mitigation instruction is reconstituted by trial judges and prosecutors into an extension of the defendant’s potential future dangerousness. Emerging from this analysis is the central role that the interpretation of the sentencing statute by legal actors play in determining how jurors view the evidence presented throughout the trial, as well as what factors they believe they are legally permitted to consider in sentencing. The findings of this study strongly suggest that the focus of the sentencing scheme on the defendant’s dangerousness inhibits jurors’ ability to view mitigation evidence unrelated to the crime as mitigating. Thus, the Texas capital sentencing statute in its application appears to prevent jurors from giving effect to personal mitigation, an essential element of a constitutionally satisfactory death penalty statute.

The study analyzed a convenience sample of published accounts of death penalty cases and life without parole cases. The objective of the study was to explore factors that influence the selection of cases for coverage in books, think tank reports (e.g., Heritage Foundation), and periodicals and factors related to coverage of homicides resulting in a death penalty sentence or a life without parole sentence (often termed “America’s other death penalty”). Since this study was exploratory, hypotheses were not offered. However, prior research on the death penalty and on life without parole offered several clues. For example, since black offender/white victim homicides were more likely to result in a death penalty sentence, it was expected that such homicides would more likely to be covered. Since conservatives were more likely to favor the death penalty and liberals were likely to oppose it, it was expected that coverage would vary by how conservative or liberal the coverage source. For example, how the Heritage Foundation covered cases was expected to be different from coverage by Human Rights Watch. In summary, my study revealed opposite results of previous research studies. The results of my study are probably skewed because of the small sample size. A bigger sample size would more than likely resulted in more accurate and reliable results.

Although s 9 of the new Constitution 1 guarantees the right to life, there is no express provision which abolishes the death sentence. Whereas in the past the death sentence could only be avoided by the exercise of judicial discretion or political and public pressure, its imposition will now have to be entirely re-evaluated. Not only are all the laws of the country subject to the new Constitution, 2 but so too a Constitutional Court will be operational which will have the power to test the constitutionality of any such laws. By looking at the standards and relevant issues which are considered to define the constitutionality of the death sentence internationally, reviewing current application of the death sentence in South Africa, drawing comparisons, and by studying the problems unique to the South African situation, it will be the aim of this dissertation to determine how the death sentence will fare under a Constitutional Court. / Criminal & Procedural Law / LL. M.

Although s 9 of the new Constitution 1 guarantees the right to life, there is no express provision which abolishes the death sentence. Whereas in the past the death sentence could only be avoided by the exercise of judicial discretion or political and public pressure, its imposition will now have to be entirely re-evaluated. Not only are all the laws of the country subject to the new Constitution, 2 but so too a Constitutional Court will be operational which will have the power to test the constitutionality of any such laws. By looking at the standards and relevant issues which are considered to define the constitutionality of the death sentence internationally, reviewing current application of the death sentence in South Africa, drawing comparisons, and by studying the problems unique to the South African situation, it will be the aim of this dissertation to determine how the death sentence will fare under a Constitutional Court. / Criminal and Procedural Law / LL. M.