Death Penalty Ruling will Impact States

by Sarah Hammond

On June 25, 2008, the United States Supreme Court barred imposing the death penalty for individuals convicted of raping a child.

The challenge in Kennedy v. Louisiana came from a Louisiana man who was sentenced to death in 2004 for the brutal rape of his 8-year-old stepdaughter. The 5-4 decision held that executing child rapists violates the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

"The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion.

The ruling will affect Louisiana and five other states, Georgia Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas, who in recent years amended their death penalty statutes to make the rape of a child a capital offense. 

Louisiana was the first to do so in 1995, adding death for the rape of a child under the age of 12.  Unlike Louisiana, the other states limited the death penalty to defendants who had previous convictions of sexual assault against a child.