Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Part I INTRODUCTION
- Part II SEARCHING FOR INTENTIONS
- Part III INTENTIONS IN DISCOURSE
- Part IV INTENTIONS IN CRITICISM
- Chapter 8 QUESTIONS OF AUTHORSHIP
- Chapter 9 LITERARY INTERPRETATION AND CRITICISM
- Chapter 10 INTERPRETING THE LAW
- Chapter 11 UNDERSTANDING ART
- Part V CONCLUSION
- Notes
- Name Index
- Subject Index
Chapter 10 - INTERPRETING THE LAW
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Part I INTRODUCTION
- Part II SEARCHING FOR INTENTIONS
- Part III INTENTIONS IN DISCOURSE
- Part IV INTENTIONS IN CRITICISM
- Chapter 8 QUESTIONS OF AUTHORSHIP
- Chapter 9 LITERARY INTERPRETATION AND CRITICISM
- Chapter 10 INTERPRETING THE LAW
- Chapter 11 UNDERSTANDING ART
- Part V CONCLUSION
- Notes
- Name Index
- Subject Index
Summary
In January 1983, William W. Thompson, then a fifteen-year-old adolescent from Oklahoma, participated in the brutal murder of his sister's former husband. The victim was shot twice, his throat, chest, and abdomen were cut, his leg was broken, and his body was chained to a concrete block and thrown into a river, where it remained for almost four weeks. Thompson told others beforehand that he was going to help commit this murder, and afterwards bragged about his actions to friends and family. Although Thompson was a “child” as defined by Oklahoma law, he was tried as an adult, convicted of the murder, and sentenced to death by the trial judge. The Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma upheld the verdict and the death sentence, and the case was then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1987. The main issue the Supreme Court considered in Thompson v. Oklahoma was whether it is constitutional to execute a person who was a “child” at the time he committed the offense. Thompson's attorneys argued that he should not be executed because this would violate Thompson's rights, as a “child,” under the Eighth Amendment, which forbids “cruel and unusual punishment.”
In June 1988 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in a majority decision, to vacate the order to execute Thompson. The majority opinion by Justice John Paul Stevens noted that “evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society” compelled the conclusion that it would be unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution to execute a person for a crime committed as a fifteen-year-old.
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- Information
- Intentions in the Experience of Meaning , pp. 273 - 292Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1999