In a decision one judge referred to as “Kafkaesque,” a 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel found that new evidence of a prison inmate’s alleged mental retardation is not enough to prevent his execution under the federal death penalty statute.

The Supreme Court outlawed the death sentence for the mentally retarded in 2002′s Atkins v. Virginia , finding that such executions violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.