Supreme Court blocks Alabama’s execution of Joseph Smith (opens in new tab)

The U.S. Supreme Court dismissed Alabama’s appeal in Hamm v. Smith, leaving in place lower-court rulings barring the state from executing Joseph Clifton Smith, who was convicted of beating a man to death in 1997. The unsigned order said the case had been “improvidently granted”. Smith’s case centered on whether constitutional protections for people with intellectual disabilities cover him. By dismissing the case after oral argument, the justices left unresolved the broader standard for future...