Donald P. Roper
Petitioner
Stephen D. Hawke, Counsel of RecordMissouri’s Capital Murder Law went into effect on May 26, 1977, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s upholding of revised State death penalty statutes in 1976. The first Missourian was executed under the new law in 1989 and, since then, the State has put 61 convicted felons to death. On August 26, 2003, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled Missouri’s law unconstitutional when applied to individuals who were under the age of 18 when they committed their crimes. Lawyers for Missouri and the superintendent of Simmons’ correctional facility, Donald P. Roper, argued that this holding ran counter…
