In 1988, Alphonso Stripling was working as a cook trainee at a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Douglasville. Shortly after the restaurant closed on October 15, 1988, he shot his four co-workers, killing two of them and injuring the other two. He then stole money from the restaurant and fled in an automobile that he stole at gunpoint. He was convicted on two counts each of murder, armed robbery, and aggravated assault and was sentenced to death for each of the murders. This Court affirmed. See Stripling v. State , 261 Ga. 1 401 SE2d 500 1991. Stripling filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus, which the habeas court granted as to Stripling’s death sentence. On appeal of that decision by the Warden, this Court concluded that the State had suppressed favorable information regarding Stripling’s alleged mental retardation and, accordingly, affirmed the habeas court’s order directing that Stripling must be retried on the question of his mental retardation and, if he is not found to be mentally retarded, retried as to sentencing. Head v. Stripling , 277 Ga. 403 590 SE2d 122 2003. Stripling’s case is now pending in the trial court, and this Court granted Stripling’s application for interim review to consider the following three questions: Did the trial court err in its order addressing what burden and standard of proof should apply to Stripling’s claim that he is mentally retarded Did the trial court err regarding the order of opening statements and closing arguments in the mental retardation phase Did the trial court err by ruling that it lacked the authority to accept a plea of guilty but mentally retarded For the reasons set forth below, we conclude that the trial court erred regarding the burden of proof to be applied to Stripling’s claim of mental retardation, that the trial court did not err by ruling that standard criminal procedural rules would apply to Stripling’s retrial on the issue of mental retardation, and that the trial court erred by ruling that it lacked the authority to consider any plea bargain that the parties might be willing to enter into. 1. Georgia law provides by statute that a defendant will be exempt from the death penalty if he or she can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he or she is mentally retarded. See OCGA § 17-7-131 c 3 and j. Stripling moved the trial court to declare the standard of proof applied to mental retardation claims to be unconstitutional. Specifically, Stripling moved the trial court to place the burden on the State to prove that he was not mentally retarded. The trial court granted Stripling’s motion in part by declaring it unconstitutional to place the burden on defendants to prove their mental retardation beyond a reasonable doubt; however, the trial court also denied Stripling’s motion in part by ruling that Stripling would bear the burden to prove his mental retardation by a preponderance of the evidence. In so ruling, the trial court relied on a decision by a three-judge panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals,1 a decision that has since been vacated for rehearing en banc. See Hill v. Schofield , 608 F3d 1272 11th Cir. 2010, vacated and reh’g en banc granted, 625 F3d 1313 11th Cir. 2010.
We have previously addressed this very issue, and we now reiterate our prior holding that Georgia’s beyond a reasonable doubt standard is not unconstitutional. See Head v. Hill , 277 Ga. 255, 260-263 II B 587 SE2d 613 2003. In addressing this issue previously, we first noted that, although the Supreme Court of the United States had recognized a constitutional right of mentally retarded defendants to be exempt from the death penalty, it had not directed the states to apply any particular burden of proof to claims of mental retardation. See Atkins v. Virginia , 536 U. S. 304 122 SC 2242, 153 LE2d 335 2002 identifying a national consensus against executing mentally retarded persons and holding that executing such persons was therefore unconstitutional. Instead, we noted that the Supreme Court “specifically left ‘ “to the States the task of developing appropriate ways to enforce the federal constitutional restriction” ‘ on executing the mentally retarded.” Hill , 277 Ga. at 260 II B quoting Atkins , 536 U. S. at 317 III citation omitted. See also Bobby v. Bies , __U. S.__, __ I, 129 SC 2145, 2150 I 173 LE2d 1173 2009 “Our opinion in Atkins did not provide definitive procedural or substantive guides for determining when a person who claims mental retardation ‘will be so impaired as to fall within Atkins’ compass.’ ” quoting Atkins , 536 U. S. at 317 III; Ferrell v. Head , 398 FSupp. 2d 1273, 1295 III D N.D. Ga. 2005 finding Georgia’s procedure regarding mental retardation to be constitutional under the direction given to the states in Atkins , rev’d on other grounds sub nom. Ferrell v. Hall , __F3d__, 2011 WL 1811132 11th Cir. May 13, 2011. We then took guidance from Leland v. Oregon , which approved the application of the beyond a reasonable doubt standard to claims of insanity at the time of defendants’ crimes, because claims of mental retardation and claims of insanity “ both relieve a guilty person of at least some of the statutory penalty to which he or she would otherwise be subject.” Hill , 277 Ga. at 261 II B citing Leland v. Oregon , 343 U. S. 790 72 SC 1002, 96 LE2d 1302 1952. Accord Ledford v. Head , 2008 WL 754486, at 3-4 II N.D. Ga. Mar. 19, 2008. We rejected the argument that claims of mental retardation were closely analogous to claims of incompetence to stand trial, which a defendant cannot be required to prove by any standard higher than a preponderance of the evidence. Id. at 261 II B distinguishing Cooper v. Oklahoma , 517 U. S. 348 116 SC 1373, 134 LE2d 498 1996. In doing so, we noted that “the special risks and limitations” faced by mentally retarded persons during their trial proceedings were “sufficiently counterbalanced by the joint safeguards” of defendants’ right to a determination of competency to stand trial under the preponderance of the evidence standard and their right to a determination of mental retardation under the beyond a reasonable doubt standard, and we also noted that Georgia was not alone in placing a burden higher than a preponderance of the evidence on defendants seeking to prove their mental retardation. Id. at 262 II B. Thus, in light of the specific statement by the Supreme Court that it had not established any particular procedural standards that must be applied to mental retardation, the similarity of mental retardation claims to claims of insanity at the time of the commission of crimes, and the persuasive effect of having sister states who have refused to declare the preponderance of the evidence standard to be constitutionally required, we held that Georgia’s beyond a reasonable doubt standard was not unconstitutional from a procedural point of view.
