Delaware top court sets death penalty argument for June
Top state court considers whether Delaware's death penalty is constitutional in light of U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
The Delaware Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on June 15 as it considers the constitutionality of the state's death penalty law.
The court has scheduled the arguments for 10 a.m. that day in Dover – giving attorneys from the Public Defender's Office and Attorney General's Office about a month and a half to prepare.
The top state court is considering the issue after the U.S. Supreme Court found in January that Florida was giving too much power to judges, and not enough to juries, when imposing death sentences.
Delaware, Florida and Alabama are the only states that allow judges to override a jury's recommendation of life.
The court is using as a test case that of Benjamin Rauf, the Temple University law graduate charged with gunning down classmate Shazi Uppal, 27, in the parking lot of a Hockessin nursing home last summer.
The Public Defender's Office has argued in briefs that the Delaware's capital punishment law has many of the same constitutional infirmities that led the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down Florida's sentencing law.
State prosecutors, however, have argued Delaware's law does not violate the Constitution.
Contact Jessica Masulli Reyes at (302) 324-2777, jmreyes@delawareonline.com or Twitter @JessicaMasulli.