Defense attorneys: Jackson's life sentence could've been death under proposed legislation

In late February, a Clay County jury recommended that Michael R. Jackson will be sentenced to life in prison without parole instead of death. Had Jackson’s retrial come later this year, it is likely (based on proposed legislation urged by Gov. Ron DeSantis) that Jackson would have been sentenced to death.

Jackson’s crimes were committed in 2007. After a trial, he was sentenced to death following the jury’s recommendation by a vote of 9-3. In the penalty phase, Jackson waived mitigation ― meaning he did not allow his attorneys to present evidence that might make him less deserving of death.

In 2012, the Supreme Court of Florida Court of Florida determined that the state committed a reversible error in Jackson’s original trial and granted Jackson a retrial.

This time, Jackson allowed his attorneys to present mitigation evidence to the jury, which included his extensive childhood trauma, including exposure to drugs in utero, as well as his positive adjustment and nonviolence in prison for the last 16 years. This change likely made the difference for Jackson.

Ultimately, the jury did not unanimously agree that the aggravating factors outweighed the mitigation. A unanimous finding is required to impose a sentence of death under Florida’s current capital sentencing statute. Therefore, the jury’s process ended, and the jury’s recommendation had to be life in prison without the possibility of parole. The jurors never got to the point of voting between life in prison without the possibility of parole or death.

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The Legislature enacted the current statute in 2017 after the U.S. Supreme Court decided in 2016 that the way Florida imposed death sentences violated defendants’ right to jury trial under the Sixth Amendment. The litigation that followed caused a wave of chaos that resulted in at least 100 resentencing proceedings, which forced victims to relive the tragedies once again. To be clear, that same outcome is likely to occur if this new statute is passed and then overturned as unconstitutional.

Under the 2017 statute, the jury must unanimously make each finding required to impose a sentence of death. The 2017 statute applied at Jackson’s retrial. But if Jackson’s retrial occurred later this year, it is possible the outcome would have been different.

In early 2023, after a push by DeSantis, the Florida Legislature proposed a new statute (SB450/HB555) that would make it much easier to sentence defendants to death in Florida. The new statute seeks to erase the procedural safeguards that were implemented in 2017. For instance, the jury would not be required to unanimously determine that the aggravation outweighs the mitigation — as they were in Jackson’s recent retrial. The proposed legislation also decreases the jury vote necessary to sentence a defendant to death. In its current iteration, the proposed legislation allows the judge to sentence the defendant to death if just eight jurors recommend death — the lowest standard in the country.

The proposed legislation was heard in committee hearings last week. If passed, the proposed legislation will position Florida as an extreme outlier even among death states and perhaps the most death-friendly state in the country. The governor and the legislators who support the proposed legislation claim that the change is necessary to protect victims.

But, especially in cases like Jackson’s, where the victim’s family has denounced the death penalty, what purpose does the legislation serve? Is it really protecting victims to introduce constitutionally precarious legislation that will undoubtedly create uncertainty and instability?

Melanie Kalmanson, a graduate of the Florida State University College of Law, has been a member of The Florida Bar since 2016. She clerked for Florida Supreme Court Justice Barbara J. Pariente in 2016-19 and serves on the steering committee for the American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Representation Project.

Maria DeLiberato is a capital defense lawyer in Tampa and the executive director of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. She has served as an assistant state attorney in Miami-Dade County and spent 13 years at Capital Collateral Regional Counsel representing death row prisoners, including Clemente Aguirre-Jarquin, Florida’s 28th death row exoneree.

This guest column is the opinion of the authors and does not necessarily represent the views of the Times-Union. We welcome a diversity of opinions.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Clay County killer could have been sentenced to death under change