Justices debate death penalty

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Justice Samuel Alito was ready to play the role of tiebreaker as the Supreme Court heard arguments for a second time Tuesday in a case that considers the constitutionality of Kansas' death-penalty law.
The court first heard arguments in the case on Dec. 7, but apparently justices were deadlocked after Justice Sandra Day O'Connor retired with a decision still pending.
Justice O'Connor was a swing vote in a number of death penalty cases, sometimes joining the four more liberal members in throwing out death sentences. Justice Alito, who joined the court in January, asked several questions of both sides during oral arguments but did not indicate how he might decide.
The 1994 law says jurors must sentence a defendant to death if they find that factors for and against the death penalty are of equal weight. The state Supreme Court struck it down, invalidating the death sentences of six convicted killers.
Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline said the law is valid because it does not stop jurors from deciding how much weight to give aggravating and mitigating circumstances in reaching a sentence. "There is no chance in this case that the jurors weren't able to take the mitigating factors and give them whatever effect they wanted," Kline said.
Attorney Rebecca Woodman with the Kansas Capital Appellate Defender's Office said the statute improperly leads jurors to choose a death sentence if they think the decision is too close to call, in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
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