Summary
Divided Connecticut Supreme Court ruling announcing that an April 2012 law, which prospectively abolished the death penalty but allowed the execution of murderers currently on the state's death row, violates the state constitution. The court's four-judge majority accepted condemned murderer Eduardo Santiago's claim that by abolishing future executions, the Legislature affirmed that capital punishment serves no penological interest and should therefore apply retroactively. CJLF was asked to join the case by Dr. William Petit, who survived a brutal 2007 home invasion robbery that resulted in the sexual assault and murder of his wife and two daughters. The two habitual felons convicted of these crimes were sentenced to death prior to the law's enactment. CJLF argued that applying a law retroactively would violate the Legislature's constitutional authority to determine the scope of the laws it enacts.
