Supreme Court Considers Whether Dementia Makes Death Penalty Cruel

Supreme Court Considers Whether Dementia Makes Death Penalty Cruel
The Supreme Court of the United States in Washington on Sept. 22, 2017. Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times
Matthew Vadum
Matthew Vadum
contributor
|Updated:

Convicted cop-killer Vernon Madison shouldn’t be executed because he can’t remember committing the 1985 murder that landed him on death row, his attorney told the Supreme Court Oct. 2.

The high court has been asked to consider whether the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment allows the execution of a prisoner whose mental disability leaves him without any recollection of committing the offense that led to the sentence of death.