About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

92 UMKC L. Rev. 153 (2023-2024)
Condemning Those with Multiple Disabilities to Die: Dual Diagnosis of Substance Abuse and Intellectual Disability in Capital Sentencing Proceedings

handle is hein.journals/umkc92 and id is 163 raw text is: CONDEMNING THOSE WITH MULTIPLE DISABILITIES TO DIE: DUAL DIAGNOSIS OF SUBSTANCE ABUSE AND INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY IN CAPITAL SENTENCING PROCEEDINGS Aliya Sternstein* and John R. Mills*** I. INTRODUCTION Ernest Johnson scored significantly below average on intelligence tests at age twelve; he grew up in a family that subjected him to sexual abuse, violence, poverty, and a ready supply of drugs; he failed multiple grade levels; and he could not connect with people socially or care for himself.' Mr. Johnson should not have been eligible for a sentence of death. The onset of his significantly subaverage intellectual functioning and struggles to adapt his behavior to his environment during the developmental period meet the medical criteria for an intellectual disability (ID)2 diagnosis.3 Nonetheless, Mr. Johnson was convicted and sentenced to death in Missouri for killing three convenience store employees.' The Eighth Amendment's protection from cruel and unusual punishments prohibits executing defendants with ID. This prohibition is rooted in both a nationwide consensus against the practice and the absence of any justification or purpose for the punishment.' Therefore, Mr. Johnson's life depended on whether he was able to prove in court that his condition met the criteria for ID. But the Missouri Supreme Court read the ID criteria described above to mean that any of his alleged deficits in adapting behavior must be caused by intellectual deficits, rather than by struggles with substance abuse.6 Because Mr. Johnson was unable to prove which specific impairment caused or did not cause * Aliya Sternstein, JD, is the manager of financial aid programs and research at Georgetown University Law Center, a contributing author at Georgetown Law's O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, and an investigative journalist who has written for Atlantic Media, The Christian Science Monitor, Congressional Quarterly, and Daily Beast, among others. **John R. Mills is an adjunct professor of law at University of California College of Law, San Francisco, and a Principal Attorney at Phillips Black, Inc. I State ex rel. Johnson v. Blair, 628 S.W.3d 375, 386-87 (Mo. 2021). 2 The American Association of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD) refers to Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities as an umbrella of disabilities, but references intellectual disability as the diagnosis of relevance to our paper. See AAIDD, INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY: DEFINITION, DIAGNOSIS, CLASSIFICATION, AND SYSTEMS OF SUPPORTS 1 (12th ed. 2021). The DSM uses the language Intellectual Disability (Intellectual Developmental Disorder). See generally American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed. 2013) (DSM-5). The relevant Supreme Court jurisprudence uses the term intellectual disability. Hall v. Florida, 572 U.S. 701, 704-05 (2014); Moore v. Texas, 581 U.S. 1, 5, (2017) (Moore I); Moore v. Texas, 139 S. Ct. 666, 667-72 (2019) (Moore I). 3 Johnson, 628 S.W.3d at 386-87. 4 Id. 5 See Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304, 306-07 (2002). 6 Johnson, 628 S.W.3d at 386-87.

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most