Essay Legal Analysis: People of Oceana v. Samantha Clark

Accordingly, CES did not respect the congressional statute that entitled a person to receive a notice or a hearing. See, the Supreme Court supported in Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. stated “the authority of an administrative agency to fulfill a congressionally created agenda involves the making of policy and rules that fill any gap left, implicitly or explicitly by Congress.

For this assignment I got the opportunity to witness the Florida Supreme Court case Thomas Theo Brown V. State of Florida presided over by Chief Justice Jorge Labarga and a panel of other justices. This case was regarding the appeal of Thomas Theo Brown, a Wendy’s employee who was convicted for fatally shooting his co-worker, Ms. Juanese Miller, back in 2009. He had been sentenced to death following the guilty verdict of first degree murder. Mr. Brown filed a challenge to his conviction, wherein he stated a claim that he should be resentenced due to a lack of objection by his original counsel regarding a claim made by the prosecution. The claim not objected to was that the defendant, Mr. Brown, had premeditated the murder in spite of the fact that he had actually admitted to second degree murder.

The people involved in defending this case was Richard G. Evans and The one against this case was Roy romer. This case came about when the christian groups went around signing petitions to put the second amendment on the ballot stating that this would repeal any state or local laws protecting lesbians, gays,or bisexual orientation. The 53% percent of colorado voted on this and it passed. That ended up with Evans the administrator in denver suing Romer for violation on the 14th amendment which prohibits states from denying anyone the equal protection of The laws.

Conway. This was the first case to weigh in on Utah’s anti-bigamy laws to state that they are constitutional. Further when Chief Justice Waite delivered the opinion of the court in discussion of the opinion further discussed if Mormons or the sects that are part of the religion practicing polygamy should be exempt from the law. The state of Utah may use this in our current case to try and show and or justify why Ms. Evans, Mr. & Mrs. Conway should not have the right to be married in a polygamous marriage, or granted a religious exemption. Lastly in Reynolds Chief Justice Waite compared polygamy as “a criminal act” which is also where the state of Utah will weigh in on this wording as well for the defense.

In the article, “Supreme Court Decision Focuses State Attention on Sentencing Regimes,” written by Don Stemen and Daniel F. Wilhelm, the authors expand the idea of the actions taken to determine the criminal sentence in the Blakely v. Washington case. In the case, Blakely argued that this sentencing procedure deprived him of his federal Sixth Amendment right to have a jury determine beyond a reasonable doubt all facts legally essential to his sentence (Blakely v. Washington, n.d). During the sentencing process, numerous aspects has to be taken into consideration to give the defendant an appropriate sentence.

In 1998, Norman Grim was convicted of murder in the Circuit Court of the First Judicial Circuit, in and for Santa Rosa County. Grim v. State, 841 So.2d 455 (Fla. 2003). At the conclusion of the penalty phase, the jury returned a unanimous generalized advisory recommendation to impose the death penalty. The court, not the jury, then made the findings of fact required to impose a sentence of death under Florida law. The court, not the jury, found beyond a reasonable doubt that those aggravating factors were “sufficient” to impose the death penalty, and that the aggravators were not outweighed by the mitigation. Based upon this fact-finding, the court sentenced Petitioner to death.

grounds that the comment made could be taken as statement of fact. The court of

On the other hand there is a series of cases regarding the death penalty which went to the Supreme Court. People tried to argue that the fact that death penalty violated the eighth amendments and that capital punishment is cruel and unusual. In 1972, Furman v. Georgia successfully brought an

For the defence, their theory was that the Crown had failed to prove that there was an offense committed and even if there was, there was insufficient evidence to prove that Mullins-Johnson was the perpetrator. Dr. Ferris and Dr. Fred Jaffe testified on behalf of the defence.[2,7]

Since America was founded, heterosexual marriages have been the only legal way to get a marital licence and be considered by the government and the state legally married. However, in 1970 Richard Baker and Michael McConnell applied for a marital licence and were denied because they were both of a male gender. In turn, the couple sued the man who denied their marriage, and it traveled all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and they still lost. This was the first ever record of a homosexual couple fighting the government for the right of same sex marriage. The battle grew and grew, becoming more popular until they came to the Supreme Court for one last appeal. On June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that all 50 states must allow a couple of

Baker v. Nelson was a court case that took place in 1971-1972. In the years leading up to this there had been many quietly handled issues regarding homosexuals rights, however they decided to start becoming more public in 1971. The Supreme court ruled in this specific case that the constitution does not protect a fundamental right for same- sex couples to get married. (Denniston). It began when a man named Richard John Baker and his partner James Michael McConnell, applied to a court clerk to get a marriage license. The court clerk denied them and then they applied to the Supreme Court from there. Some people still say that this is a binding decision

Nelson. In 1972, two University of Minnesota students of the same-sex applied for marriage. Their request was denied because of a state law that restricted marriage to “persons of opposite sex”. The couple filed a lawsuit against the marriage clerk that denied their request, Gerald Nelson. The coupled stated that the denial violated their due process and equal protection rights granted in the Fourteenth Amendment and their privacy right granted in the First and Ninth Amendments (Scarinci, 2012). The couple also tried using the precedent of the Loving v. Virginia case of 1967, which allowed interracial marriage (Loving v. Virginia, n.d.). The lower court upheld the denial, and when brought to the Supreme Court, the denial remained upheld. The Courts believed there was no correlation between couples of the same-sex, and couples of different races (Scarinci, 2012).

Over the past two decades, substantial progress has been made in regards to views of equality for homosexual orientation. In 1996, the case of Romer v. Evans (517 U.S. 620, 116 S. Ct. 1620, 1996) was determined by the United States Supreme Court. In the early 1990s, Colorado passed an amendment that did not allow “ordinances outlawing discrimination against homosexuals” (Page 1616, Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 116 S. Ct. 1620 (1996)). As expected, many individuals, like Richard Evans, were distressed by this new legislation. When it went to court, this amendment was declared unconstitutional under the basis of the Equal Protection Clause, because the Fourteenth Amendment promises that “no purson shall be denied the equal protection of the law” (Page 1618, Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620, 116 S. Ct. 1620 (1996)). When the case eventually made its way to the Supreme Court of the United States, Justice Kennedy gave the majority of the opinion of the court, stating that “Amendment 2 classifies homosexuals not to further a proper legislative end but to make them unequal to everyone else. This Colorado cannot do. A state cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws. Amendment 2 violates the Equal Protection Clause, and the judgment of the Supreme Court of Colorado is affirmed” (Page 1620, Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620,

The first case is Furman v. Georgia in 1972. In this case, “Georgia jury convicted three men for murder and all three juries that had worked to give them a penalty chose the death penalty without any specific guidelines to aid or limit their discretion.” (FVG) This case halted all executions in the 39 states that sanctioned executions; Approximately 600 inmates were waiting on death row at the time of this case. The second case is Gregg v. Georgia in 1976. In this case, “the defendant was convicted of two counts of armed robbery and two counts of murder.” (GVG) The defendant was sentenced to death under new Georgia death penalty statute that replaced the statute from the Furman v. Georgia

With roots in Christianity, the United States has a history of hostile viewpoints towards same-sex relationships. The legality of same-sex marriages did not surface until the 1970s. The first and most well known issue that rose regarding same-sex marriages happened on May 18th, 1970, two men tried for a marriage license in Heppenin County, Minnesota. The Minnesota Supreme Court refused to issue the license saying it violated common law ("The History of the Legalization of Same-Sex Marriage"). The Court stated that marriage must only be granted between a man and a woman. “In 1993, the Hawaii Supreme Court overruled the state 's statutes that limited marriages to opposite sex couples by citing it unconstitutional without compelling evidence” ("The History of the Legalization of Same-Sex Marriage"). While this initially seemed like a step in the right direction for same-sex relationships, in 1996, President Bill Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA),