Complete Home & Office Legal Guide/Complete Home and Office Legal Guide (Chestnut) (1993).ISO/stat/ussct/delemb2.asc

Text File | 1993-08-01 | 54KB | 971 lines

    This is not to say that petitioner's affidavits are
without probative value.  Had this sort of testimony been offered
at trial, it could have been weighed by the jury, along with the
evidence offered by the State and petitioner, in deliberating
upon its verdict.  Since the statements in the affidavits
contradict the evidence received at trial, the jury would have
had to decide important issues of credibility.  But coming 10
years after petitioner's trial, this showing of innocence falls
far short of that which would have to be made in order to trigger
the sort of constitutional claim which we have assumed, arguendo,
to exist.

    The judgment of the Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.


    Justice O'Connor, with whom Justice Kennedy joins,
concurring.

    I cannot disagree with the fundamental legal principle
that executing the innocent is inconsistent with the
Constitution.  Regardless of the verbal formula employed--
contrary to contemporary standards of decency,- post, at 1
(dissenting opinion) (relying on Ford v.  Wainwright, 477 U. S.
499, 406 (1986)), "shocking to the conscience," post, at 1
(relying on Rochin v. California, 342 U. S. 165, 172 (1952)), or
offensive to a -`-principle of justice so rooted in the
traditions and conscience of our people as to be ranked as
fundamental,-'- ante, at 16 (opinion of the Court) (quoting
Medina v. California, 505 U.S. ___, ___ (1992) (slip op. 7-8), in
turn quoting Patterson v. New York, 432 U. S. 197, 202
(1977))-the execution of a legally and factually innocent person
would be a constitutionally intolerable event.  Dispositive to
this case, however, is an equally fundamental fact: Petitioner is
not innocent, in any sense of the word.

    As the Court explains, ante, at 7-8, petitioner is not
innocent in the eyes of the law because, in our system of
justice, "the trial is the paramount event for determining the
guilt or innocence of the defendant." Ante, at 25.  Accord, post,
at 13 (dissenting opinion).  In petitioner's case, that paramount
event occurred 10 years ago.  He was tried before a jury of his
peers, with the full panoply of protections that our Constitution
affords criminal defendants.  At the conclusion of that trial,
the jury found petitioner guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Petitioner therefore does not appear before us as an innocent man
on the verge of execution.  He is instead a legally guilty one
who, refusing to accept the jury's verdict, demands a hearing in
which to have his culpability determined once again.  Ante, at 8
(opinion of the Court).

    Consequently, the issue before us is not whether a State
can execute the innocent.  It is, as the Court notes, whether a
fairly convicted and therefore legally guilty person is

constitutionally entitled to yet another judicial proceeding in
which to adjudicate his guilt anew, 10 years after conviction,
notwithstanding his failure to demonstrate that constitutional
error infected his trial.  Ante, at 16, n. 6; see ante, at 8.  In
most circumstances, that question would answer itself in the
negative.  Our society has a high degree of confidence in its
criminal trials, in no small part because the Constitution offers
unparalleled protections against convicting the innocent.  Ante,
at 7 (opinion of the Court).  The question similarly would be
answered in the negative today, except for the disturbing nature
of the claim before us.  Petitioner contends not only that the
Constitution's protections -sometimes fail,- post, at 2
(dissenting opinion), but that their failure in his case will
result in his execution- even though he is factually innocent and
has evidence to prove it.

    Exercising restraint, the Court and Justice White assume
for the sake of argument that, if a prisoner were to make an
exceptionally strong showing of actual innocence, the execution
could not go forward.  Justice Blackmun, in contrast, would
expressly so hold; he would also announce the precise burden of
proof.  Compare ante, at 26 (opinion of the Court) ("We assume,
for the sake of argument in deciding this case, that in a capital
case a truly persuasive demonstration of `actual innocence' made
after trial would render the execution of a defendant
unconstitutional and warrant federal habeas relief if there were
no state avenue open to process such a claim"), and ante, at 1
(White, J., concurring in judgment) (assuming that a persuasive
showing of actual innocence would render a conviction
unconstitutional but explaining that, even under such an
assumption, -petitioner would at the very least be required to
show that based on proffered newly discovered evidence and the
entire record before the jury that convicted him, `no rational
trier of fact could [find] proof of guilt beyond reasonable
doubt.' Jackson v.  Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 314 (1979)-), with
post, at 14 (dissenting opinion) (I would hold that, to obtain
relief on a claim of actual innocence, the petitioner must show
that he probably is innocent).  Resolving the issue is neither
necessary nor advisable in this case.  The question is a
sensitive and, to say the least, troubling one.  It implicates
not just the life of a single individual, but also the State's
powerful and legitimate interest in punishing the guilty, and the
nature of state-federal relations.  Indeed, as the Court
persuasively demonstrates, ante, at 7-26, throughout our history
the federal courts have assumed that they should not and could
not intervene to prevent an execution so long as the prisoner had
been convicted after a constitutionally adequate trial.  The
prisoner's sole remedy was a pardon or clemency.

    Nonetheless, the proper disposition of this case is
neither difficult nor troubling.  No matter what the Court might
say about claims of actual innocence today, petitioner could not
obtain relief.  The record overwhelmingly demonstrates that
petitioner deliberately shot and killed Officers Rucker and
Carrisalez the night of September 29, 1981; petitioner's new
evidence is bereft of credibility.  Indeed, despite its stinging
criticism of the Court's decision, not even the dissent expresses
a belief that petitioner might possibly be actually innocent.
Nor could it:  The record makes it abundantly clear that
petitioner is not somehow the future victim of -simple murder,-
post, at 18 (dissenting opinion), but instead himself the
established perpetrator of two brutal and tragic ones.

    Petitioner's first victim was Texas Department of Public
Safety Officer David Rucker, whose body was found lying beside
his patrol car.  The body's condition indicated that a struggle
had taken place and that Rucker had been shot in the head at
rather close range.  Petitioner's Social Security card was found
nearby.  Shortly after Rucker's body was discovered, petitioner's
second victim, Los Fresnos Police Officer Enrique Carrisalez,
stopped a car speeding away from the murder scene.  When
Carrisalez approached, the driver shot him.  Carrisalez lived
long enough to identify petitioner as his assailant.  Enrique
Hernandez, a civilian who was riding with Carrisalez, also
identified petitioner as the culprit.  Moreover, at the time of
the stop, Carrisalez radioed a description of the car and its
license plates to the police station.  The license plates
corresponded to a car that petitioner was known to drive.
Although the car belonged to petitioner's girlfriend, she did not
have a set of keys; petitioner did.  He even had a set in his
pocket at the time of his arrest.

/* The opinion at this point is trying to make a virtue out of
the overwhelming evidence against Herrerra. The point here being
that the case is not one that should be used to determine the
point. */

    When the police arrested petitioner, they found more than
car keys; they also found evidence of the struggle between
petitioner and Officer Rucker.  Human blood was spattered across
the hood, the left front