SAN FRANCISCO How conservative was the California Supreme Court on death penalty cases under Chief Justice Malcolm Lucas?
On Friday, two Republican-appointed judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit granted a death row defendant a new trial, saying California’s high court misapplied clearly established law 20 years ago by finding harmless error where a key defense witness was blocked from testifying and a prosecutor argued that a white victim would not have had consensual sex with a black man.
