SCOTUS Dismisses Alabama Death Sentence Case In Divided Ruling
A divided Supreme Court of the United States on Thursday rejected Alabama’s effort to move forward with the execution of Joseph Clifton Smith, a convicted murderer whom lower courts found to be intellectually disabled.
The decision leaves intact lower court rulings that favored Smith, 55, who has spent roughly half of his life on death row after being convicted in the 1997 beating death of a man.
The case centered on the legal standards used to determine intellectual disability in death penalty cases, an issue the high court has addressed several times over the past two decades.
In 2002, the Supreme Court barred the execution of intellectually disabled individuals in its landmark decision in Atkins v. Virginia. Later rulings in 2014 and 2017 expanded on that standard, instructing states to consider broader evidence in close cases because IQ tests include a recognized margin of error.
Smith’s case involved the question of how courts should treat defendants whose IQ scores fall just above the commonly recognized threshold of 70. Smith received five IQ test scores ranging from 72 to 78.
His attorneys argued that those scores did not tell the full story. They said Smith had been placed in special education classes for students with learning disabilities and left school after seventh grade. They also claimed that at the time of the crime, he performed math at a kindergarten level, spelled at roughly a third-grade level, and read at approximately a fourth-grade level.
The Supreme Court had taken up the case to consider how lower courts should handle borderline intellectual disability claims in capital punishment cases. Oral arguments were heard in December.
Rather than issuing a sweeping ruling on the merits, however, the court dismissed Alabama’s appeal, an unusual move that leaves the lower court decision in Smith’s favor standing.
The majority included the court’s three liberal justices, along with Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
The court’s four other conservative justices dissented. They criticized the federal appeals court in Atlanta, arguing that it had improperly analyzed Smith’s claims. The dissenters said the Supreme Court should have ordered the lower court to reconsider the case under the proper legal framework.
The decision is another example of the court’s internal divisions on death penalty procedures, federal court review, and the balance between enforcing lawful criminal sentences and applying constitutional limits established by earlier precedent.
While conservatives generally support strong enforcement of criminal penalties and respect for state court judgments, the case also reflects a recurring constitutional question: how far federal courts should go in policing state death penalty cases where intellectual disability claims are disputed.
The ruling leaves Alabama unable to proceed with Smith’s execution unless the state finds another legal path forward.
Separately, the Supreme Court also declined this week to review a $2.4 billion bankruptcy settlement involving the Boy Scouts of America.
The justices dismissed an appeal brought by a group of childhood sexual abuse victims who argued that the settlement unlawfully limited their ability to sue organizations that operated or sponsored local scouting programs.
The appeal came from a group of 75 victims among more than 82,000 claimants against the Boy Scouts. They argued that the court should revisit the settlement in light of last year’s Supreme Court ruling involving Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin.
In that case, a 5-4 majority rejected a bankruptcy settlement that would have shielded members of the Sackler family from future lawsuits, even though their wealth came from operating the company.
In the Boy Scouts case, some victims want to pursue lawsuits against independent councils that managed local scouting programs, as well as third-party groups such as churches and civic organizations that sponsored those programs.
Those third-party organizations contributed billions of dollars to a settlement trust for victims. Under the agreement, they receive protection from future civil lawsuits.
Critics argue that bankruptcy courts generally should not have the power to block lawsuits against third parties that are not themselves bankrupt. Supporters counter that without such protections, large bankruptcy settlements involving many parties may collapse, leaving victims with less compensation and years of additional litigation.
The Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy in 2020 after spending more than $150 million to resolve numerous abuse lawsuits between 2017 and 2019, according to court documents.
In 2022, a federal bankruptcy court in Delaware approved the reorganization plan, allowing the Boy Scouts to emerge from bankruptcy while creating a fund to compensate victims. Lower courts, including the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, upheld the settlement.
The Lujan claimants asked the Supreme Court to take up the case in October. The court had already rejected an emergency appeal from the same group of victims in early 2024.
Together, the two Supreme Court actions show a court still wrestling with difficult questions involving criminal justice, constitutional limits, victims’ rights, bankruptcy law, and the power of lower courts to shape major legal outcomes.