Procedure set for determining mental retardation in capital cases

Friday, January 6th 2006, 6:30 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- An Oklahoma appellate court says murder defendants who claim to be mentally retarded can ask for a jury instead of a judge to decide whether they should face the death penalty.

The ruling by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals drew a sharply worded dissent from the court's vice presiding judge. Judge Gary L. Lumpkin says the courts shouldn't be doing the Legislature's work.

The US Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that states can't execute mentally retarded defendants accused of first-degree murder, the only crime punishable by death. Justices left it up to each state to make the rules.

The new procedures are part of an opinion involving the appeal of a man charged in an Oklahoma County capital murder case.