diminished capacity

In the early hours of June 21, 2000, Officer Jeffrey Moritz of the Flagstaff Police responded in uniform to complaints that a pickup truck with loud music blaring was circling a residential block. When he located the truck, the officer turned on the emergency lights and siren of his marked patrol car. This prompted petitioner Eric Clark, the truck’s driver (then 17), to pull over. Officer Moritz got out of the patrol car and told Clark to stay where he was. Less than a minute later, Clark shot the officer. The officer died soon after but not before calling the police dispatcher for help. Clark ran away on foot but was arrested later that day with gunpowder residue on his hands. The gun that killed the officer was found nearby, stuffed into a knit cap. Clark was charged with first-degree murder under Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. §13–1105(A)(3) for intentionally or knowingly killing a law enforcement officer in the line of duty. In March 2001, Clark was found incompetent to stand trial and was committed to a state hospital for treatment. Two years later the same trial court found his competence restored and ordered him to be tried. Clark waived his right to a jury, and the case was heard by the court. At trial, Clark did not contest that he shot the officer or that the officer died. He relied on his own undisputed paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the incident to deny that he had the specific intent to shoot an officer or knowledge that he was doing so. The prosecutor offered circumstantial evidence that Clark knew the victim was a police officer. The prosecutor also offered testimony indicating that Clark had previously stated he wanted to shoot police and had lured the victim to the scene to kill him. In presenting the defense case, Clark claimed mental illness. He sought to introduce it for two purposes. First, he raised the affirmative defense of insanity. This put the burden on himself to prove by clear and convincing evidence that at the time of the crime he was afflicted with a mental disease or defect of such severity that he did not know the criminal act was wrong. Second, he aimed to rebut the prosecution’s evidence of the requisite mens rea. Ruling that Clark could not rely on evidence bearing on insanity to dispute the mens rea, the trial court cited the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Mott. That decision refused to allow psychiatric testimony to negate specific intent. It held that Arizona does not allow evidence of a mental disorder short of insanity to negate the mens rea element of a crime. As to his insanity, Clark presented lay testimony describing his increasingly bizarre behavior over the year before the shooting. This included testimony that Clark thought Flagstaff was populated with aliens trying to kill him and that bullets were the only way to stop them. A psychiatrist testified that Clark was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia with delusions about aliens when he killed the officer. The psychiatrist concluded that Clark was incapable of luring the officer or understanding right from wrong and was thus insane at the time of the killing. In rebuttal, the State’s psychiatrist gave his opinion that Clark’s paranoid schizophrenia did not keep him from appreciating the wrongfulness of his conduct before and after the shooting. The judge then issued a first-degree murder verdict. The judge found that Clark had not established that his schizophrenia distorted his perception of reality so severely that he did not know his actions were wrong. Clark moved to vacate the judgment and life sentence. He argued that Arizona’s insanity test and its Mott rule each violate due process. The trial court denied the motion. Affirming, the Arizona Court of Appeals held that the State’s insanity scheme was consistent with due process. The court read Mott as barring the trial court’s consideration of evidence of Clark’s mental illness and capacity directly on the element of mens rea. The Supreme Court of Arizona denied further review. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Roughly 25 minutes after Anthony Covington had been shot, Detroit police responded to a 911 call reporting that a gunshot victim had appeared at a neighborhood gas station. They quickly arrived at the scene, and in less than 10 minutes five different Detroit police officers questioned Covington about the shooting. Each asked him a similar battery of questions: what happened and when, who shot the victim, and where did the shooting take place. After Covington would answer, they would ask followup questions, such as how tall is the shooter, how much does he weigh, what is the exact address or physical description of the house where the shooting took place, and what chain of events led to the shooting. The battery relented when the paramedics arrived and began tending to Covington's wounds. Covington knew the threatening situation had ended six blocks away and 25 minutes earlier when he fled from Bryant's back porch. Bryant had not confronted him face to face before he was mortally wounded, instead shooting him through a door. Covington knew the shooting was the work of a drug dealer, not a spree killer who might randomly threaten others. Covington interrupted their interrogation to ask when is EMS coming. Sergeant Wenturine admitted that he interrogated Covington because he had a man here that he believed was dying so he was gonna find out who did this, period. The fifth officer to arrive at the scene did not need to run straight to Covington and ask a battery of questions to determine the need for emergency assistance. The value of asking the same battery of questions a fifth time was to ensure that Covington told a consistent story and to see if any new details helpful to the investigation and eventual prosecution would emerge. Bryant was convicted after the first jury could not reach a verdict. The Michigan Supreme Court reversed the conviction, and the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Brandon Joseph Williams, an Army veteran, was convicted by a jury of murdering Veta Karla Conrad, known as Karla. The jury assessed punishment at sixty-seven years' confinement and a $10,000 fine. Williams timely appealed to the Court of Appeals of Texas, Houston (14th Dist.). Karla and her daughter Sarah were living with Williams at the residence of his mother, Belinda Sue Williams, in Lake Jackson, Texas. Karla and Sarah shared Sue's bedroom while Sue slept on the living room couch and Williams had his own bedroom. On the night of the shooting, Williams, who had been using synthetic marijuana and methamphetamine, woke Sue and said he heard something outside. He told her to take Karla and Sarah into the bathroom, but Sue refused to avoid scaring them. Williams went through the kitchen and out the backdoor. Sue rose and saw him standing in the breezeway by the garage. He appeared startled, fell backwards, then raised and pointed his gun at her while advancing and yelling for her to get on the ground. Sue backed up, turned on a lamp, identified herself as his mother, and knelt on one knee. A single bullet from Williams's gun struck Karla, who had entered the room behind Sue. Sue tackled Williams, causing the gun to fly out of his hand, and held him down until police arrived after Sarah called 911. Approximately twelve hours after the shooting and after emergency medical treatment, Williams gave a recorded statement to investigators. In the statement he described seeing a figure, directing it to put its hands up and identify itself, and firing one round. He acknowledged shooting someone and described delusions and fighting with the devil. Williams tested positive for amphetamines and cannabis; the attending emergency room physician noted his heart rate, blood pressure, and respiratory rate were so elevated from the drugs that an abnormally high level of benzodiazepines was required. At trial Sue testified that she believed Williams had been suffering from PTSD or a flashback, though she had been unaware of his recent drug use in the house.

In November 1999, fourteen-year-old Kuntrell Jackson and two other boys decided to rob a video store in Arkansas. En route, Jackson learned that one of the boys carried a sawed-off shotgun. Jackson initially stayed outside the store but later entered while the robbery was underway. When the clerk, Laurie Troup, refused to hand over money and threatened to call the police, one of Jackson's co-defendants shot and killed her. The three boys fled without taking any money. Arkansas prosecutors exercised their discretion to charge Jackson as an adult with capital felony murder and aggravated robbery. A jury convicted him of both offenses. The trial court imposed the statutorily mandated sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Jackson did not challenge the sentence on direct appeal, and the Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed the convictions. In 2003, fourteen-year-old Evan Miller and a friend, Colby Smith, spent an evening drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana with Miller's neighbor, Cole Cannon, at Cannon's trailer in Alabama. After Cannon passed out, Miller stole his wallet. Cannon awoke and grabbed Miller by the throat. Smith struck Cannon with a baseball bat, and Miller then repeatedly hit Cannon with the bat. The boys set two fires in the trailer before leaving. Cannon died from his injuries and smoke inhalation. Miller had previously been in and out of foster care, regularly used drugs and alcohol, and had attempted suicide four times. Alabama law initially required that Miller be charged as a juvenile, but the district attorney sought and obtained removal of the case to adult court. A jury convicted Miller of murder in the course of arson. The trial court imposed the statutorily mandated sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction and sentence. Following this Court's decisions in Roper v. Simmons and Graham v. Florida, Jackson filed a state habeas petition arguing that his mandatory life-without-parole sentence violated the Eighth Amendment. The circuit court dismissed the petition, and the Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed. Miller's direct appeal was likewise unsuccessful. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in both cases.

Christopher Simmons was 17 years old and a junior in high school when he committed the murder of Shirley Crook in Missouri. Simmons planned the crime with two friends, Charles Benjamin and John Tessmer, discussing breaking into a home, tying up a victim, and throwing the victim off a bridge. On the night of the murder, Simmons and Benjamin entered Crook's home through an open window, bound her with duct tape, drove her to a state park, reinforced her bindings with electrical wire, wrapped her face in duct tape, and threw her from a railroad trestle into the Meramec River, where she drowned. Simmons was arrested the next day at his high school after bragging about the killing. Police read him his Miranda rights, and he waived his right to an attorney before confessing and agreeing to a videotaped reenactment at the crime scene. The State charged him with burglary, kidnapping, stealing, and first-degree murder. Because Simmons was 17 at the time of the crime, he fell outside Missouri's juvenile court jurisdiction under Mo. Rev. Stat. §§ 211.021 and 211.031 and was tried as an adult. At trial the State introduced Simmons' confession, the videotaped reenactment, and testimony about his advance planning and later bragging. The defense called no guilt-phase witnesses. The jury convicted Simmons of first-degree murder. In the penalty phase the State presented victim-impact testimony from Crook's family and proved three aggravating factors. The defense presented testimony from Simmons' family and a juvenile justice officer about his lack of prior record and family relationships, and both sides addressed his age as a mitigating factor. The jury recommended death, and the trial judge imposed it. Simmons obtained new counsel and moved for postconviction relief, arguing ineffective assistance because trial counsel had not presented evidence of his immaturity, impulsiveness, difficult home environment, substance abuse, and poor school performance. The trial court denied the motion. The Missouri Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence on direct appeal and the denial of postconviction relief. Federal habeas relief was also denied. After this Court decided Atkins v. Virginia in 2002, Simmons filed a new state postconviction petition arguing that Atkins required the same categorical exemption for juvenile offenders. The Missouri Supreme Court agreed, set aside the death sentence, and resentenced Simmons to life imprisonment without parole. The U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari.