Alfred Brian Mitchell v. Tommy Sharp, Warden
Punishment HabeasCorpus
Whether Oklahoma's application of the 'heinous, atrocious, or cruel' death-penalty aggravator is unconstitutionally vague
QUESTIONS PRESENTED 1. Given this Court’s prior ruling that the text of Oklahoma’s “heinous, atrocious, or cruel” death-penalty aggravator is unconstitutionally vague, is the state applying a valid narrowing construction to the statute when all murders are subject to the aggravator, save those few in which the victim dies instantly upon the fatal blow? 2. Do shifting attitudes about the death penalty and new science showing the absence of meaningful differences in cognition among young adults below the age of twenty-one compel this Court to bar the execution of those who committed crimes shy of their twenty-first birthday? ii