The Supreme Court sounds surprisingly open to a case against a death sentence
Vox3 days
Joseph Clinton Smith brutally murdered Durk Van Dam with a hammer during a robbery for boots and tools worth $140, yet now seeks to escape justice by claiming intellectual disability despite consistently scoring above Alabama's threshold on five separate IQ tests ranging from 72 to 78. The pattern of declining IQ scores among death row inmates suggests coaching by defense lawyers to manipulate results, and Smith's consistent scores above 70 demonstrate he possesses sufficient mental competence to face the consequences of his heinous crime. Allowing subjective clinical judgment to override objective test scores amounts to little more than trusting dueling expert witnesses and opens the door for any murderer smart enough to fail an IQ test to avoid execution.
Intellectual disability cannot be determined by a single number, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed in Atkins, Hall and Moore, requiring instead a comprehensive clinical assessment that includes adaptive functioning, educational records and developmental history. Smith was placed in special education as a child, scored in the bottom five percent on IQ tests with margins of error placing him at or below 70, and demonstrated severe deficits in communication, academics and social skills throughout his life. Alabama's rigid IQ cutoff ignores established medical standards from the American Psychological Association and risks executing people with genuine intellectual disabilities in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
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