Justices question court’s power to reconsider death penalty case

At issue is whether the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals followed the proper procedures when it decided, of its own accord, to reconsider the case of convicted murderer Gregory Thompson after previously denying his appeal.

Thompson was convicted in 1985 of killing Brenda Lane, a 28-year-old former newspaper reporter who was abducted from a Wal-Mart parking lot in Shelbyville, Tenn., driven to a remote area and fatally stabbed with a rusty butcher knife.

Thompson confessed to the crime and a jury sentenced him to the death penalty. His case worked through state and federal courts, and after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to consider it, Tennessee set an Aug. 19, 2004, execution date. That process was stopped in June 2004, partly because of the appeals court’s decision to vacate its earlier ruling.

Jennifer L. Smith, an attorney representing the state, argued that federal law required the appellate court to issue a “mandate,” or notice signaling the end of its authority, within seven days of the Supreme Court’s decision not to take the case.

The Cincinnati-based court never issued the mandate in Thompson’s case, and the inmate’s lawyers argued that gave the court flexibility to reconsider its decision when a judge discovered new information.

While appellate Judge Richard F. Suhrheinrich was researching a law review article on capital cases, he looked over Thompson’s file and found the opinion of an expert witness who believed Thompson suffered from schizophrenia. The expert’s opinion had been appended into an appeal but never entered into the record.

Calling the expert’s opinion significant, the court withdrew its decision 18 months after denying Thompson’s appeal and sent the case back to district court for an evidentiary hearing.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg questioned why a court couldn’t reconsider an earlier decision if a judge finds a “key piece of evidence” was left out of consideration.

“This is a death case,” she said.

But Smith said the law provides procedures for courts to withdraw a mandate and reconsider a case if new evidence indicates there had been a “miscarriage of justice.”

She said because Thompson’s guilt wasn’t in question and the jury had found three factors that warranted giving him the death penalty, the mental-health opinion wouldn’t change his situation.

Justices also questioned how the appeals court handled its review. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said it was “remarkable” the court hadn’t notified attorneys when starting its second review.

And when Thompson’s attorney Matthew M. Shors said the state should have checked with the court to resolve any questions about the mandate, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist questioned whether “counsel should go see the docket sheet regularly to see if the court might be doing something.”

Ginsburg called Thompson’s case “really idiosyncratic.”

“In practice, is there any other case in the world like this?” Ginsburg asked. “I don’t know of any.”

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The case is Bell v. Thompson, 04-514.