The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a new case asking it to make a ruling on the constitutionality of capital punishment.
Without comment, the justices declined to hear an appeal by Shonda Walter of her death penalty sentence for killing an 83-year-old Pennsylvania man in 2003.
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In a petition, Walters’ lawyer Daniel Silverman wrote that her case “exemplifies what is wrong for the death penalty,” citing ineffective assistance of counsel at trial, as well as the arbitrariness and racial bias in death sentences in Pennsylvania.
The District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania had already upheld a decision by a lower court, saying there was enough evidence found to support her conviction for first-degree murder and eventual death sentence.
Walter v. Pennsylvania is one of the cases many thought could cause the justices to take up the constitutionality of capital punishment. Experts say Justice Stephen Breyer’s dissent last year provided a blueprint for a broad challenge to the death penalty.
Justice Antonin Scalia also said in September that he “wouldn’t be surprised” if the court ruled the death penalty unconstitutional.
However, the court did allow the Jan. 21 execution of an Alabama death row inmate to proceed over Breyer’s objections.
