The Tennessee Supreme Court has enacted a rule formalizing the legal process for setting execution dates in capital cases and establishing filing deadlines and other requirements for prosecution and defense lawyers.
“Whenever a death-row prisoner has unsuccessfully pursued state post-conviction relief through appeal or application for permission to appeal to this court, should there be no execution date in effect, the state attorney general shall file a motion requesting that this court set an execution date,” the Supreme Court rule states.
Under the rule, defense attorneys must file any response within 10 days of the motion requesting an execution date. The same 10 day deadline applies under a separate provision requiring the attorney general to file a motion with the Supreme Court requesting an execution date after completion of the standard three-tier appeals process - direct appeal of the conviction and death sentence, state post conviction appeal and federal habeas corpus proceedings.
In the response, attorneys are to include any legal or factual grounds for delaying the execution date or supporting a claim that no date should be set or no execution should occur, including a claim of incompetency. In a ruling last year, Van Tran v. State, the court said prisoners must file incompetency claims within 10 days of a motion by the state attorney general seeking an execution date. In a 1986 decision, Ford v. Wainwright, the U.S. Supreme Court directed states to establish procedures for determining the sanity of death-sentenced inmates.
The court will set an execution date no less than 30 days from the date of the order granting the state’s motion. If the inmate receives a stay or reprieve extending through the execution date, a new date will be set by the court when the stay or reprieve has been lifted or has expired. The new date will be no less than seven days after the date of the order setting it.
Other provisions of the Supreme Court rule spell out how motions, responses and other legal documents in capital cases are to be filed and how filing deadlines will be computed.