Appeals Court Upholds California Death Penalty

On November 12, 2015, the United States 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld
the constitutionality of the California Death Penalty and in so doing reversed the ruling by the US District Court that decided under the 8th Amendment it was unconstitutional as cruel and unusual punishment because of lengthy and unpredictable delays. The California Attorney General argued the delays were a result of the number and length of time involved in the legal maneuvers and appeal process that affords inmates their constitutional right to file appeals and writs of habeas corpus.

The history of the case is that in 2003, the California Supreme Court upheld the underlying conviction of the defendant/inmate on first-degree murder and rape charges.

In California since 1978, there have been approximately 900 defendants sentenced to death, with only 13 actual executions, and none in about ten years. Executions at San Quentin State Prison have been on hold since 2006 when a Federal Judge deemed there to be legal issues with the then current and past combined multi-drug lethal procedures. Since there is now a national shortage of single lethal drugs that too poses additional problems. In California, there are now about 750 inmates on death row (about 100 died while imprisoned due to other causes).