Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989)

E576851

Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989), was a U.S. Supreme Court decision that held the Eighth Amendment did not categorically bar the execution of individuals with intellectual disabilities, a stance later reversed by Atkins v. Virginia.

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Statements (45)

Predicate Object
instanceOf United States Supreme Court case
criminal law case
death penalty case
areaOfLaw capital punishment
constitutional law
criminal procedure
arguedDate 1988-10-11
citation 492 U.S. 302
constitutionalProvisionInterpreted Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
country United States
court Supreme Court of the United States
decisionDate 1989-06-26
dissentingJustices Harry A. Blackmun
John Paul Stevens
Thurgood Marshall
William J. Brennan Jr.
docketNumber 87-6177
holding Texas’s special-issue capital sentencing scheme did not allow the jury to give full mitigating effect to evidence of Penry’s intellectual disability and childhood abuse
The Eighth Amendment does not categorically prohibit the execution of persons with intellectual disabilities
joinedByInMajority Anthony M. Kennedy
Antonin Scalia
Harry A. Blackmun
John Paul Stevens
Thurgood Marshall
William H. Rehnquist
William J. Brennan Jr.
jurisdiction Texas
languageOfOpinion English
legalIssue Whether Texas’s capital sentencing instructions permitted adequate consideration of mitigating evidence
Whether execution of a person with intellectual disability violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments
majorityOpinionBy Sandra Day O’Connor
originatingCourt United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
petitioner Johnny Paul Penry
rearguedDate 1989-03-27
relatedCase Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002)
linked to: Atkins v. Virginia

Penry v. Johnson, 532 U.S. 782 (2001)
respondent James A. Lynaugh
respondentOffice Director, Texas Department of Corrections
result Judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part
subsequentHistory Position on categorical execution of persons with intellectual disabilities overruled by Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002)
topic intellectual disability and the death penalty
mitigating evidence in capital sentencing
vote 5–4 on the adequacy of Texas’s sentencing instructions
6–3 on the Eighth Amendment categorical bar question

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Referenced by (4)

Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.

opinion in Atkins v. Virginia overruledPrecedentCitation Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989)
Atkins v. Virginia overruledPrecedent Penry v. Lynaugh
linked to: Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989)
Penry v. Lynaugh fullName Penry v. Lynaugh
linked to: Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989)
Montgomery v. Louisiana relatedCase Penry v. Lynaugh
linked to: Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302 (1989)