DeSantis expands Florida death penalty law, defying U.S. Supreme Court

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Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) expanded Florida’s death penalty law, potentially setting up a future U.S. Supreme Court case. The measure was the second recent expansion of capital punishment; the first allowed non-unanimous jury verdicts in trial sentencing.

Vowing Florida “stands for the protection of children,” DeSantis signed the law during a campaign-style event in Titusville, touting his record on issues involving “law and order.”,

The law will still go into effect even though it is unconstitutional. In 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a 5 to 4 decision that struck down a Louisiana law that allowed a child rapist to be sentenced to death, barring states from executing child sex predators unless they also murdered their victims.

The new requirement states that just eight of 12 jurors must agree to sentence someone to death, one of the lowest thresholds in the nation. DeSantis pushed for that expansion after a jury failed to apply the death penalty to Nikolas Cruz, who killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2017, during his trial in Broward County last year.

 

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