Justices ponder death-case transfers
The extent of Gov. Rick Scott’s power was on trial Wednesday as Florida Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments about whether Scott had the authority to remove 24 death-penalty cases from Orange-Osceola State Attorney Aramis Ayala.
Roy Austin Jr., the Washington, D.C.-based attorney representing Ayala in the case, argued Scott overstepped his constitutional bounds by taking the cases away from her.
“What [Scott] has decided here is that he can simply take a case away, and he doesn’t have to give a reason,” Austin said.
Ayala, who took office in January, said at a March news conference that she will not seek the death penalty in any cases. Scott responded by taking 24 cases away from her
office and assigning them to State Attorney Brad King of Ocala.
Florida Solicitor General Amit Agarwal argued for Scott, saying that because Ayala announced she would never seek the death penalty under any circumstances, she was not upholding the law.
“Is it really the case that every single elected prosecutor in this state may adopt a blanket policy of refusing to adopt or enforce any state law with which the prosecutor disagrees with as a matter of policy?” Agarwal asked. “And is there anything the state can do about it?”
Liberal and conservative justices alike asked questions about establishing a precedent allowing a state attorney to opt not to seek the death penalty.
“Hasn’t she effectively nullified the death-penalty law in the 9th Judicial Circuit?” Justice Barbara Pariente, a member of the court’s liberal bloc, asked Austin.
But Justice Peggy Quince, another liberal member on the bench, also noted that current law is vague in how it describes a governor’s power to remove a prosecutor. State law says the governor can replace a state attorney in a particular case for a “good and sufficient reason.”
“The problem with that argument then is what we’re ending up with is the governor with unfettered discretion,” Quince said.
Pariente mentioned the case of Markeith Loyd, arrested in January and accused of murdering his pregnant ex-girlfriend, Sade Dixon, and an Orlando police officer, Lt. Debra Clayton, and noted there were obvious “aggravators,” or external factors that could lead a prosecutor to seek capital punishment.
Justices, however, did not bring up the case of Juan Rosario, who since March has been convicted in the first-degree murder of Elena Ortega, an 83-year-old who lived in his east Orange County neighborhood. King oversaw prosecution of the case. A jury unanimously recommended the death penalty, though Rosario has not yet been formally sentenced.
Ayala’s stance has roused passions and reinvigorated the debate about the death penalty across the country.
Her announcement came after a year in which capital punishment in Florida was in limbo. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year that Florida’s laws allowing judges to issue death sentences on the non-unanimous recommendation of a jury was unconstitutional. The Florida Legislature passed a bill signed into law by Scott this year requiring unanimous juries to issue death sentences.
Rafael Zaldivar, whose son Alex was killed by Bessman Okafor in Ocoee in 2012, attended the hearing. Okafor was sentenced to death by an 11-1 jury vote, but he was ordered to be resentenced because the jury’s vote wasn’t unanimous. Okafor’s case is one
Liberal and conservative justices alike asked questions about establishing a precedent allowing a state attorney to opt not to seek the death penalty.
of the 24 reassigned to King.
“I think [Ayala’s] attorneys need to go back to law school, because I don’t think they understand what’s happening here. It’s obvious that she’s taken a position on herself not to prosecute death-penalty cases,” Zaldivar said.
Ayala contends that she acted within her powers as an elected state attorney and the cases should be returned to her.
“The presentation of their arguments here today confirms the point that I violated no laws. There are no Florida statutes that I was required to seek the death penalty; there was no blueprint to follow,” Ayala told reporters after the hearing. “I did what I believed was proper under Florida law.”
There is no deadline for the court to issue a ruling.