
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, March 5, 1990                   TAG: 9003052224
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-10   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                 LENGTH: Short

DEATH PENALTY DECISIONS MIXED

The Supreme Court today gave state prosecutors greater leeway in what they tell juries choosing life or death for convicted murderers, voting 5-4 to uphold a California man's death sentence.

But the court also voted 6-3 to set aside a North Carolina murderer's death sentence as it reaffirmed a decision making it easier for capital-case jurors to consider all "mitigating evidence."

And in a third death-penalty ruling, the justices split 5-4 in ruling that an Oklahoma murderer is procedurally barred from contending that a jury wrongly was told to ignore "sympathy" before it sentenced him to death.

None of the three decisions is likely to affect many of the some 2,200 death row inmates across the nation.

In another decision, the court ruled today that even when criminal defendants are questioned unlawfully by police their responses may be used to contradict trial testimony by the defendants.

By a 5-4 vote in a Michigan case, the court said the Constitution does not bar use of such statements when they are used by prosecutors to rebut a defendant's testimony and impeach the accused person's credibility.

by CNB