Death Without Due Consideration?: Overcoming Barriers to Mitigation Evidence by 'Warming' Capital Jurors to the Accused

Abstract:     
A significant concern in capital trials is the formidable obstacles impeding the jurors’ ability to consider defense mitigation evidence at sentencing. Race, economic status and guilt phase fact contamination impose are weighty barriers to due consideration. Co-author Brewer’s groundbreaking empirical study analyzing the perceptions capital jurors form about the defendant offers new and revealing insight about how jurors’ perceptions of capital defendants are shaped and how they bear on the jurors’ life or death decision. This article sets forth the study and its conclusions and explores efforts that can be taken by defense counsel to implement the findings in overcoming the barriers to juror consideration of mitigation evidence.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 59

Keywords: capital cases, juror, capital defendants, defense mitigation

Accepted Paper Series