Maryland Court Backs Death Penalty

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By Associated Press

Published: 12/17/2001

Maryland's highest court has upheld the state's death penalty law, clearing the way for executions in a state where 13 inmates are on death row.
The Thursday ruling comes eight months after the state had halted executions to consider appeals about the law's fairness.
The ruling came in an appeal by Lawrence Borchardt, who was convicted in the 1998 deaths of a Baltimore County couple. His attorney, Fred Bennett, argued that the U.S. Supreme Court nullified Maryland's death penalty law last year when it ruled that a New Jersey court was wrong to increase a defendant's prison sentence for a hate crime beyond the statutory maximum.
The Court of Appeals ruled that the Supreme Court decision does not apply to Maryland's death penalty law. The court also noted that capital punishment statutes across the nation could be overturned if Maryland's law were to be struck down.
A divided U.S. Supreme Court said the law should not have given judges the discretion to increase prison time by considering factors not weighed by jurors or proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
When a defendant is convicted in Maryland, a judge or jury may only sentence him to die if there is sufficient evidence showing that aggravating circumstances outweighed mitigating factors.
The standard is not as strict as the 'reasonable doubt' standard, and cannot be used to increase the penalty from life in prison to death, Bennett argued.
The Court of Appeals also concluded that execution is part of the sentencing range authorized by the state legislature for first-degree murder.
'We cannot conceive that the Supreme Court intended such a dramatic result to flow from a case that did not even involve a capital punishment law,' Judge Alan M. Wilner wrote on behalf of the majority.
Bennett said he would ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the appeal.
Maryland has 13 inmates on death row, including Steven Oken, another of Bennett's clients who was convicted of raping and killing three women in 1987. He is appealing his sentence on the same grounds, but has exhausted his federal appeals and could be executed next year if his U.S. Supreme Court appeal fails.
In April, the Court of Appeals effectively halted the death penalty when it refused to expedite a ruling in Oken's case. The Thursday ruling clears the way for his execution and others in the state.
'Obviously, this decision is not good news for Mr. Oken,' Bennett said. 'Basically, one vote makes a difference to everybody on death row.'

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