Cornell Associate Professor of Law John H. Blume was scheduled to argue a case involving the death penalty before the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, Feb. 22. In the case, Holmes v. South Carolina, Blume, the director of the Cornell Death Penalty Project, will argue on behalf of Bobby Lee Holmes, a South Carolina death row inmate.

Holmes is requesting that the Supreme Court reverse an earlier judgment of the South Carolina Supreme Court and order a new trial, at which Holmes is permitted to present all the evidence relevant to his innocence. This was to be Blume's sixth argument before the Supreme Court.

The question before the court is whether it is a violation of the Sixth and 14th Amendments to prevent a defendant in a capital case from presenting evidence that a third party committed the crime. In Holmes' case, a third party claimed to have committed the crime for which Holmes was convicted, although forensic evidence implicated Holmes.

The South Carolina Supreme Court concluded that Holmes' evidence of third party guilt could not "overcome" the forensic evidence offered by the prosecution. South Carolina law is unique in requiring that a criminal defendant cannot present evidence that someone else committed the crime unless the evidence overcomes the prosecution's forensic evidence.

Holmes contends that the application of the South Carolina third-party guilt rule to the facts of his case deprived him of his due-process and Sixth Amendment rights after the York County (S.C.) trial court, the state's appellate court and the South Carolina Supreme Court all refused to admit evidence that linked a third party to the crime. By a 4-1 vote, the South Carolina Supreme Court upheld Holmes' conviction in November 2004. The U.S. Supreme Court accepted the case for review in September 2005.

"South Carolina's legal standard for admitting evidence of third-party guilt rule is so stringent that it is tantamount to a categorical rule excluding evidence that someone else committed the crime," Blume said. "Furthermore, the rule usurps the role of the jury by placing the judge in the position of determining how likely it is the defendant is guilty before the defendant is permitted to present the jury with evidence of the defendant's innocence. No other state conditions admissibility of defense evidence on a judge's assessment of the defendant's guilt. Additionally, the South Carolina Supreme Court's decision is inconsistent with the court's 1973 decision in Chambers v. Mississippi, where a similar exclusion of evidence was found to violate a defendant's due process right to present a complete defense."

Additional information about this case can be viewed at http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/cert/.