WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court opened the door Monday for two new challenges to the death penalty, allowing the use of new DNA evidence to contest an old murder conviction and allowing an appeal based on the practice of lethal injection.
In House vs. Bell, the court held for the first time that DNA evidence that undercuts a defendant's guilt is reason enough for a federal judge to reopen a case.
The second case acknowledges the new research that suggests lethal injections could cause intense pain. The court unanimously agreed that a federal judge should hear a Florida inmate's claim that the lethal injection procedure the state intended to use was unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment.
The medical research on lethal injections has triggered appeals that challenge the procedure in many states, including California. Earlier this year, a federal judge in San Jose ordered a hearing into California's lethal injection procedure, set for Sept. 19.
In the pair of decisions, the high court made clear that it views the death penalty as subject to especially close scrutiny.
Support for the death penalty has been shaken by a number of revelations over the last decade that people condemned to death had been wrongly convicted.
At the same time, the high court and Congress have made it harder for federal judges to reopen capital cases, responding to complaints over seemingly endless hearings.
But on Monday, the court shifted course slightly and announced two exceptions to the rules against reopening death penalty cases in federal court.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy delivered both decisions for the court. With the retirement of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, he has assumed the center spot when the court is closely split along ideological lines.
Twenty years ago, Paul House, a paroled rapist and a newcomer to a rural east Tennessee town, was found guilty of murdering a woman who lived two miles away.
Prosecutors theorized he had tried to rape the victim. A decade later, lawyers learned that a semen stain on her nightgown had come from the victim's husband, not House.
In a 5-3 decision, the court said such "reliable new evidence" was reason enough for a federal judge to reopen his case.
DNA evidence has freed scores of prisoners, including some who were on death row. Lawyers for the Innocence Project based in New York predicted Monday's ruling would have a broad effect because it removed a barrier to having some of these cases heard in federal court.
