People v. LaValle

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People v. LaValle
Court	New York Court of Appeals
Full case name	The People of New York v. Stephen S. LaValle
Decided	June 24, 2004
Citation	3 N.Y.3d 88
Case history
Prior history	Defendant convicted, N.Y. Sup. Ct. Suffolk Co.
Holding
The current statute of capital punishment in the state of New York was unconstitutional as it violated article one, section six of the state constitution.
Court membership
Chief judge	Judith Kaye
Associate judges	Robert S. Smith, George Bundy Smith, Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick, Albert Rosenblatt, Victoria A. Graffeo, Susan Phillips Read
Case opinions
Majority	G. Smith, joined by Kaye, Ciparick
Concurrence	Rosenblatt
Dissent	R. Smith, joined by Graffeo, Read
Laws applied
N.Y. Const. art. I, § 6; N.Y. C.P.L. § 400.27(10)

People v. LaValle, 3 N.Y.3d 88 (2004), was a landmark decision by the New York Court of Appeals, the highest court in the U.S. state of New York, in which the court ruled that the state's death penalty statute was unconstitutional because of the statute's direction on how the jury was to be instructed in case of deadlock. New York has since then abandoned the death penalty, as the law has not been amended.