Weeks v. Angelone (No. 99-5746) - Opinion Announcement
: I have the opinion of the Court to announce in No. 99-5746, Weeks against Angelone.
Virginia jury found the petitioner Lonnie Weeks Jr., guilty of the murder of Virginia State Trooper.
At sentencing the prosecution sought to prove too aggravating circumstances, and petitioner presented 10 witnesses in mitigation.
While the jurors were deliberating, they sent the trial judge a note, the jurors note asked, whether assuming that they had found that the prosecution proved in aggravating circumstance, they were required to give the death penalty or could choose between a life sentence and the death penalty.
The judge responded by directing the jurors to the precise paragraph of the jury instruction that dealt with their question, and we have previously held in our Buchanan opinion that this jury instruction satisfies the Constitution.
Two hours later the jury returned a verdict finding one of the aggravating circumstances and sentencing the petitioner to death.
The Virginia Supreme Court affirmed the conviction in sentence.
A Federal Habeas District Court denied relief and the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the denial of habeas relief.
Petitioner argues that the manner in which the trial judge answered the juror’s question did not resolve their confusion.
Thus he contends there exists a reasonable likelihood that the jurors felt they were not free to consider mitigating evidence in violation of our cases.
For reasons set out in detail in our opinion, we hold that petitioner is not demonstrated that such a reasonable likelihood exists.
Accordingly, we conclude that petitioner is not entitled to habeas relief under Section 2254(d) and the judgment of Court of Appeals is affirmed.
Justice Stevens has filed a dissenting opinion in which Justice Ginsburg and Breyer joined and in which Justice Souter joins in part.
