Atkins MR/ID Court Decision: Boyston v Az (2013)

 

Thanks to Kevin Foley for sharing another Atkins court decision.

Boyston v Az (2013)

 

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Atkins MR/ID Court Decisions: Six decisions (US, MS, AZ, FL, TN, PA)

Due to a medical procedure at the end of December, I have fallen seriously behind in my posting of a number of Atkins decisions that have occurred at the end of December and in January. Thanks to Kevin Foley and a few other individuals for sending me copies of the decisions. The following decisions are posted without comment.

• Candelario-Santano v USA (Puerto Rico; 2013)
• Goodin v MS (2012)
• Grell v AZ (2013)
• Hall v FL (2012)
• Keen v TN (2012)
• Williams v PA (2013)

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Atkins MR/ID death penalty decisions: Bies; Murphy; Sosa; Fults: Moormann

Five recent Atkins decisions. I have fallen way behind and need to post these all at once to clear my in box

Bies v Bagley (OH; 2012)

Sosa v Texas (TX; 2012)

Murphy v Oklahoma (2012). Prior 2002 decision here.

Fults v Upton (GA, 2012)

Moormann v Scriro (AZ, 2012)



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Court Decision: Ramirez v Ryan (AZ, 2010)---follow up FYI

In the previous "So close, yet so far away--Or how the burden of proof matters" guest post by Kevin Foley the Atkins case of Ramirez v AZ raised a number of significant issues such as IQ practice effects, the Flynn effect, the burden of proof, preponderance of the evidence standard, etc (see prior post for more details). 

This past month a decision was made in the Ramirez v Ryan (AZ, 2010) federal habeas corpus case in the  Arizona District Court.  The decision outlines the complexity of a number of interesting and recurring issues (e.g., the Flynn Effect; practice effect) in Atkins cases, and the difficulty possed to the courts by dueling experts with differing opinions.    Due to a lack of time I will not make any additional comments.  This is an FYI post.

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Court decision: So Close, Yet So Far Away – Or How the Burden of Proof Matters (Ramirez v AZ 2010) - Guest post Kevin Foley

Below is another guest blog post (by Kevin Foley) re: the recent denial of post conviction relief from execution due to mental retardation/intellectual disability.  As per ICDP guest post policy, these guest posts are presented "as is" with additional URL links added by the blogmaster.  Any guest post does not necessarily represent the opinions of the ICDP blogmaster.  Kudos Kevin F for continuing to provide thought provoking guest posts.


Do you have a guest post in you?  Please contact me at iap@earthlink.net if you do.

Is another “intellectually disabled” death row inmate due to slip through the cracks?  Arizona inmate David Martinez Ramirez presented a Post Conviction Relief (PCR) claim in the Superior Court for Maricopa County seeking a ruling that he was exempt from the death penalty due to mental retardation.  His claim was heard by a judge (not a jury) who denied his claim on the basis that Ramirez “failed to show by clear and convincing evidence that he is mentally retarded.”[1] However, a review of the court’s opinion begs the question whether Ramirez would have prevailed had the burden of proof been the more common, “by a preponderance of the evidence” standard.

In his opinion, the trial judge, Thomas W. O’Toole, specifically concluded that, “If the Flynn Effect was required to be used in scoring these tests, the court finds that the defendant has proved by a preponderance of the evidence that his full score IQ score is 70 or lower.”[2]  Similarly, the court stated that, “the conflicting evidence shows by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant had significant adaptive behavior deficits” and “THE COURT FINDS by a preponderance of the evidence that the onset of the Defendant’s adaptive behavior deficits occurred before he reached the age of 18.”[3]

The bottom line of Ramirez is that – with the application of the Flynn Effect – and considering the court’s statements surrounding the elements of a mental retardation (IQ of 70 or below, adaptive behavior deficits, and onset before age 18), Ramirez would have been found to be mentally retarded, except for the application of the heavy-handed “clear and convincing” burden of proof.

Another court, applying the same or similar facts using the lesser standard of proof of “preponderance of the evidence” could achieve– and in fact has achieved - a different result. In the matter of Kenneth Glenn Thomas, the federal habeas court was also faced with multiple IQ scores from an extended period of time, including a high score of 77 – the same highest score obtained by Ramirez.[4]  Despite the objections of the state concerning the district court’s application of the standard error of measurement and the Flynn Effect, the federal appeals court held that the district court’s application of these concepts was not reversible error. The Eleventh Circuit observed that, “The district court considered the Flynn Effect just as it considered the other evidence in the record” and it “exercised its discretion to consider the SEM  . . . and we cannot say that this was clear error.”[5]

While every case has different facts, and I cannot say beyond peradventure that Ramirez is intellectually disabled, it certainly looks like the outcome turned on the burden of proof.  Is this what the U.S. Supreme Court envisioned – different outcomes depending on what state the person calls home?


1  Ruling, State v. Ramirez, Maricopa County Super. Ct. Case No. CR 1989-005726 (Apr. 4, 2007), rev. denied, Case No. CR-07-0177 (Ariz., Nov. 29, 2007) (unpub.), cert. denied, 553 U.S. 1056 (2008).
2  Id. at 4 (n. 5). One could argue that the court would have reached the same conclusion even if the preponderance standard was used – in light of the court’s resolution of the Flynn Effect issue. However, the court appeared to resolve the Flynn Effect issue as an issue of fact, not a matter of law. This assertion is borne out by the  court’s analysis surrounding the Flynn Effect and the court’s discussion of the different experts’ approach to using (or not) the Flynn Effect in calculating IQ scores and whether the WAIS-III manual recommends that it be applied.  So it is equally arguable that the court would have applied the Flynn Effect if the preponderance standard was used, and the fact that it did not was because the clear and convincing standard was used.
3  Id. at 7.
4  Ramirez obtained an 87 on one testing, but the court seemed to reject this score because “the practice effect skewed and raised the score to 87”. Id. at 2.
5  Thomas v. Allen, __ F. 3d __, Case No. 09-12869 (11th Cir., May 27, 2010).

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Court Decisions: Ochoa (2010), McDade (2010) and Robinson (2010)

I'm working on cleaning up the backlog of Atkins decisions that have occurred recently.  In this post three more are added to the Court Decisions blogroll.  I've only skimmed these three briefly and only make brief comments (I can no longer keep up with reading and analyzing decisions----I'm more in an "FYI archive posting mode" for rulings at this time).  Thanks again to Kevin Foley for monitoring the pulse of decisions and sending copies my way.

Ochoa v Workman (OK, 2010) - Appears to be a week Atkins claim with Ochoa's own expert said not ID/MR.  Ochoa tried to argue even though maybe not ID/MR now he was at time of the murder, and that should be the point of inquiry. The court did not buy this argument saying that it is present level of functioning, not the past. This cases raises the interesting issue/problem of variability across states on the "time of MR/ID".  Many states specify the person must be ID/MR now and before the end of the developmental period (before age 18).  Other states add the additional criteria that the person must have been ID at the time of the crime.  And at least one state (Arkansas I believe) specifies only ID at time of the crime.  The Atkins can of worms just keeps growing.

McDade v US (Al, 2010).  This is a federal criminal case involving sex crimes and is an example of  the proposition that Atkins might being extended beyond death penalty cases.  McDade is ID/MR. Under federal criminal law, if convicted, the sentencing judge must consider the sentence which is recommended under the "sentencing guidelines" (which uses various factors to come up with a range of what is thought to be  an appropriate sentence), and the judge is supposed to articulate supporting facts if he/she wants to sentence above or below the recommended range. Here ID/MR was used as a justification to depart downward from the guidelines. However, it wasn't much of a departure - guidelines recommended 292-360 mos in federal prison; judge sentenced McDade to 240 mos - 20 years. Reading the case one gets the feeling that McDade was a follower and this may be illustrative of the concept of gullibility.

Robinson v Schriro (Az, 2010).  Not an Atkins case per se. Of interest was the appeals court's conclusion that Robinson was denied effective assistance of counsel. Robinson's attorney presented no witnesses at sentencing and appeared to only attack the state's effort to show aggravating factors. Court based its decision, in large part, on the failure to present evidence of Robinson's low IQ, which was reported as being a FSIQ of 81.  The state post-conviction judge (who heard the ineffective assistance claim in state court) was unimpressed with the IQ score, and relied instead on the so-called "street smarts" of Robinson.


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