The panel voted, 9-3, Thursday to send Cruz to prison for the rest of his life rather than execute him. Florida law demands unanimous jury verdicts to impose a death sentence, but that was based on a 2016 Florida Supreme Court ruling forbidding majority-only verdicts. That ruling, in turn, relied on a U.S. Supreme Court decision requiring unanimity. However, the new DeSantis court receded from its precedent in January 2020 after reinterpreting the U.S. Supreme Court opinion. It was among at least four rulings in which the court abandoned precedents affecting the death penalty.

Source: CNN October 14, 2022 18:33 UTC