Bulletin: Timothy Hurst Florida: Major development; Supreme Court of the United States declares Florida's death penalty unconstitutional in an 8-1 opinion, because Florida’s death penalty statute gives the sentencing judge, rather than the jury, the ultimate responsibility to find aggravating factors and make the sentencing determination. Innocence Project of Florida says "The decision may invalidate the sentences of many or even most of the roughly 400 individuals on death row, requiring new sentencing hearings, and will likely lead to a legislative amendment of Florida’s death penalty statute to conform it with the constitutional parameters announced in Supreme Court precedent."...Innocent Project Director Seth Miller notes: "“It is heartening that the United States Supreme Court recognized the need for core, necessary procedural safeguards to have a death penalty system in Florida. No person should be sentenced to death and executed as a result of a system that does not comport with the Constitution. Florida also leads the nation in exonerations from death row. Florida similarly should adopt a number of procedural safeguards, such as updates to procedures for collecting eyewitness evidence, recording of custodial interrogations and preventing the taint of unvalidated forensic sciences on trials, all of which are leading causes of wrongful convictions. Until such time that these and other safeguards are adopted, Florida should put a moratorium on death sentences and executions, as the risk of wrongful execution is too great.”...Link to the opinion provided; (I couldn't agree more. HL);

From a release issued by the Innocence Project of Florida issued today, 12  January, 2016; "This morning, the Supreme Court of the United States issued an 8-1 opinion in Hurst v. Florida (No. 14-7505), holding Florida’s death penalty scheme unconstitutional. The Court found that because Florida’s death penalty statute gives the sentencing judge, rather than the jury, the ultimate responsibility to find aggravating factors and make the sentencing determination, the statute violates Ring v. Arizona and the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial. The decision may invalidate the sentences of many or even most of the roughly 400 individuals on death row, requiring new sentencing hearings, and will likely lead to a legislative amendment of Florida’s death penalty statute to conform it with the constitutional parameters announced in Supreme Court precedent.
IPF Executive Director Seth Miller, made the following statement on behalf of the organization: “It is heartening that the United States Supreme Court recognized the need for core, necessary procedural safeguards to have a death penalty system in Florida. No person should be sentenced to death and executed as a result of a system that does not comport with the Constitution. Florida also leads the nation in exonerations from death row. Florida similarly should adopt a number of procedural safeguards, such as updates to procedures for collecting eyewitness evidence, recording of custodial interrogations and preventing the taint of unvalidated forensic sciences on trials, all of which are leading causes of wrongful convictions. Until such time that these and other safeguards are adopted, Florida should put a moratorium on death sentences and executions, as the risk of wrongful execution is too great. You can read the opinion here."
http://floridainnocence.org/content/?p=12225

See USA Today story: "The ruling in the case brought by death row prisoner Timothy Hurst won't affect other states, where juries have considerably more power and their verdicts must be unanimous. Still, it's another setback for proponents of capital punishment nationally at a time when the Supreme Court is hearing many such cases — and could ultimately rule on whether the death penalty itself violates the Constitution."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/12/supreme-court-florida-death-penalty-sentence-judge-jury/76466834/