Jackson v. State
The Florida Supreme Court affirmed Michael Jackson's death sentences imposed after a 2023 resentencing under the newly amended section 921.141, which allows a death sentence based on an 8-4 (rather than unanimous) jury recommendation. The Court rejected fourteen challenges, including facial and as-applied Eighth Amendment, equal protection, bill-of-attainder, and res judicata attacks on the 2023 amendments, and also rejected claims regarding jury instructions, prosecutorial comments, and exclusion of a codefendant's recantation and life sentence, finding any errors unpreserved and non-fundamental.
Key facts
- Michael Jackson was convicted and sentenced to death in 2005; he received a new resentencing proceeding in 2023 under Florida's amended section 921.141, which permits death sentences based on an 8-4 jury recommendation rather than unanimity.
- At resentencing, Jackson's jury recommended death by an 8-4 vote, and the trial court imposed death sentences; Jackson appealed, raising fourteen constitutional challenges to the 2023 amendments and other trial errors.
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Why it matters
This is the Florida Supreme Court's first substantive review of the 2023 legislative amendments permitting death sentences based on non-unanimous (8-4) jury recommendations, and it forecloses a broad array of… — full analysis with a trial
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