Fifteen states now do not allow imposition of the death penalty, while other states, including, Colorado, Kansas, Maryland and Montana, are considering following suit.

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/03/18/new.mexico.death.penalty/index.html

The Court had previously held that no federal laws allowed the death penalty in rape cases. The federal military law, an amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Conduct, was first mentioned in an internet blog by a civilian Air Force attorney.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/10/us-supreme-court-declines-to-rehear.php

Previously, prosecutors for the state of Louisiana filed a petition requesting that the Court reconsider its ruling in the case that referenced the limited amount of state law and supposedlly no federal law that allowed such punishment. The federal law, an amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Conduct, was first mentioned in an internet blog by a civilian Air Force attorney.

Five out of the nine justices will have to vote for a rehearing.

Source: http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/SCOTUS/story?id=5760359&page=1

Cooey made a similar request in 2003, which the Ohio Parole Board denied. Cooey came within a day of being executed that year before a federal judge issued a reprieve. If his execution proceeds as scheduled on October 14, 2008, it will be the first execution in Ohio since the end of a moratorium while the U.S. Supreme Court reviewed Kentucky’s lethal injection procedure.

Source: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-08-25-death-row_N.htm

The Department of Justice previously admitted its failure to inform the Court of an amendment to a military law that allows the death penalty as punishment for child rape cases. As a result, the Court did not take this military law into consideration in making its decision, which was based on current state law and the lack of federal law regarding the applicability of capital punishment in such cases.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/07/doj-seeks-supreme-court-rehearing-of.php

The US Department of Justice recently admitted its mistake in failing to inform the Supreme Court of the amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Conduct after a civilian Air Force attorney first mentioned the law in his internet blog. Rehearing petitions are not usually granted, and the law may not be considered relevant as the original case involved a civilian.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/07/military-law-could-change-supreme-court.php

According to the Court, capital punishment is appropriate only in cases involving murder. The Court held that “[d]ifficulties in administering the penalty to ensure its arbitrary and capricious application require adherence to a rule reserving its use, at this stage of evolving standards and in cases of crimes against individuals, for crimes that take the life of the victim.”

The decision was 5-4 in the case of Kennedy v. Louisiana.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/25/scotus.child.rape/; http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gvFhjUc6MV97U-QbYuuM2VMimB8w

The US Supreme Court in Baze addressed a challenge based on the US Constitution, which does not require that lethal injections be free from any and all risk of pain. The decision by the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas in Elyria, Ohio, on the other hand, is based on an Ohio law that requires lethal injections to use ”a drug or combination of drugs of sufficient dosage to quickly and painlessly cause death.” The judge stated the state law ”demands the avoidance of any unnecessary risk of pain and, as well, any unnecessary expectation by the condemned person that his execution may be agonizing or excruciatingly painful.”

Two men, Ruben O. Rivera and Ronald McCloud, who have not been tried but were charged with murder during a robbery and raping and killing a woman respectively, brought the case, in which the Ohio Supreme Court refused to intercede to address an argument that the proceeding was premature. 

Source: http://www.lexisone.com/news/nlibrary/n061108b.html

William Earl Lynd was executed for kidnapping and murder shortly after the US Supreme Court rejected his request for a stay on his execution on the basis that the murder was not premeditated.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080507/ap_on_re_us/georgia_execution;_ylt=ApdbQ.aT4Pq38pkmWsohK_BI2ocA

Jack Alderman, an inmate convicted of murder whose execution was stayed pending the US Supreme Court’s decision, argued that Georgia did not have in place the safeguards used in Kentucky, such as training of officials to perform the executions and confirmation by such officials that an inmate is unconscious prior to administering additional drugs. The state, however, contended that Georgia uses trained officials to carry out executions, experienced licensed nurses who monitor the consciousness of inmates and standby physicians.

Georgia may conduct the first execution since the Baze case of William Earl Lynd on May 6, 2008.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/05/federal-judge-rejects-challenge-to.php