Posted on 07/08/2011 1:01:47 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
WASHINGTON — In a 5-to-4 decision that split along ideological lines, the Supreme Court on Thursday evening rebuffed a request from the Obama administration that it stay the execution of a Mexican citizen on death row in Texas. The inmate, Humberto Leal Garcia Jr., was executed about an hour later.
……On Thursday, in an unsigned majority opinion, the Supreme Court said that Congress had had plenty of time to act and that the court would not now “prohibit a state from carrying out a lawful judgment in light of unenacted legislation.”
“Our task,” the majority wrote, “is to rule on what the law is, not what it might eventually be.”
The majority also noted that “the United States studiously refuses to argue that Leal was prejudiced by the Vienna Convention violation,” suggesting that a fresh hearing would do Mr. Leal no good. He was convicted of kidnapping, raping and killing a 16-year-old girl.
“We decline,” the majority wrote, “to follow the United States’ suggestion of granting a stay to allow Leal to bring a claim based on hypothetical legislation when it cannot even bring itself to say that his attempt to overturn his conviction has any prospect of success.”
Justice Stephen G. Breyer, in a dissent joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, wrote that the government’s request was modest, given that allowing the execution to proceed would, in the solicitor general’s words, “cause irreparable harm” to “foreign-policy interests of the highest order” and endanger Americans traveling abroad.
The court should defer to the executive branch’s assessment, Justice Breyer wrote, as “the Court has long recognized the president’s special constitutionally based authority in matters of foreign relations.”……..”In reaching its contrary conclusion,” Justice Breyer wrote, “the Court ignores the appeal of the president…
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Had all the attributes of a true liberal himself.
Yecccchhhh.
I love the smell of refried beaners in the morning......kudos to Gov Perry and board of pardons for having a pair.
Yip, yip, yip yipee!!!!
Which means that 5 follow the Constitution and 4 do not.
Same here. Good to know I'm not the only one.
It’s too bad they didn’t have two more nasties to execute; they could have done it Pancho Villa style. (lined them up in threes and then only use one bullet to kill all three.)
One down and millions to go.
Since his arrest, he had steadfastly denied raping and murdering Sauceda."
HahahahaHAHAHAHA!!! Thanks for the laugh to start my Friday morning out on a great note.
If you want some objective facts from the United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit. - 428 F.3d 543 date October 13, 2005. You may need as strong stomach. First page of Google did not indicate that anyone was interested in the details of the crime. Still researching, especially after listening to BBC Radio last night.
http://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/428/543/565370/
I hope the libs vote in the same manner when confronted with any case appeal with its orgins in the Fast and Furious gun running project which resulted in countless deaths of Mexicans in MEXICO.
“Mexican citizen”
MSM are sure playing up that angle.
Trouble is, he was across the border when the committed the crime, etc.
That makes him an “Illegal Alien”.
[Perry sent a signal to the UN, to Mexico, and to the Obama Administration — his middle finger!.]
Good riddance. Texas eradicated another pile of wasted molecules. That miscreant didn’t deserve to live as long as he did, from the time he slaughtered that 16 year old girl. Viva Mexico? No. Viva Texas!
I suppose the Reds are at least smart enough to have the ever odious Ginsburg retire before Zero is booted out of office, so that he can appoint a YOUNGER Communist Jew to take her place.
“I never vote for female judges.
Same here. Good to know I’m not the only one.”
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Make it three.
Too big a risk of the man-hating syndrome which is now firmly in place in AMerican CommieAcademia.
The President can only commute sentences and issue pardons in Federal cases.
The Governor of Texas had the ultimate authority over those matters in this case.
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