Alabama Death Row Inmate Cannot Be Execute Because He Was Disabled, Appeals Court Says

Friday, federal court appeals say that the Alabama death row inmate cannot be executed because he has an IQ in the 70s, agreeing with a lower court’s ruling that he is intellectually disabled and was sentenced to death for murdering a man in 1997.

Alabama Death Row Inmate Cannot Be Execute Because He Was Disabled, Appeals Court Says (PHOTO: ABC 33/40)

Alabama Death Row Inmate Cannot Be Execute Due To Being An Intellectually Disabled Person

According to the ruling issued by the Atlanta-based 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the decision on Friday implies that 53-year-old Joseph Clifton Smith, a death row inmate cannot be executed unless the decision is overturned by the US Supreme Court.

CNN reported that Smith’s IQ scores have consistently placed his IQ higher than that of someone who is intellectually disabled according to Amanda Priest, communications director for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall. Moreover, the Attorney General believes that his death sentence was both just and constitutional.

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In 2021 US District Court Judge Ruled That The Alabama Death Row Inmate Has An Intellectual Disability And Can’t Be Sentenced To Death

A US District Court judge ruled in 2021 that the Alabama death row inmate has an intellectual disability that is not allowed to be “constitutionally be executed,” and vacated his death sentence. The judge referenced the district court’s result that Smith has intellectual and adaptive functioning issues apparently surfaced before he was 18 years of age,” according to the 2021 appeals court ruling, which agreed with the lower court.

AP News that the court ruling stated that the death row inmate record shows that he has as low as 72 and as high as 78 on IQ tests over the years and has proven evidence of poor intellectual and adaptive functioning ever since he was a child.

Alabama law that intellectual disability defines as a person having an IQ of 70 or below, “significant or substantial deficits in adaptive behavior” and the onset of those issues before the age of 18.

Smith used to be in school programs when he was young, a school for students who are learning with intellectual disabilities. Smith also fail the seventh and eighth grades before dropping out of school for good. Smith’s attorney, who has been defending him for years is victorious for the verdict.

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