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Constitutional Law Keyed to Choper
Woodson v. North Carolina
Citation:
428 U.S. 280 (1976)Facts
On June 3, 1974, petitioners Woodson and Waxton, along with two others (Tucker and Carroll), participated in an armed robbery of a convenience store. During the robbery, Waxton fatally shot the cashier at point-blank range and wounded a customer. Tucker and Carroll testified for the prosecution after pleading guilty to lesser offenses. Waxton claimed during trial that Tucker had fired the shots, while Woodson maintained he had been coerced by Waxton to participate. The petitioners were convicted of first-degree murder and, as required by North Carolina’s statute enacted following Furman v. Georgia, were automatically sentenced to death. North Carolina had responded to Furman by eliminating jury discretion in capital sentencing and making death the mandatory punishment for first-degree murder. The statute defined first-degree murder as murder committed by means of poison, lying in wait, imprisonment, starving, torture, premeditated killing, or during the commission of certain felonies.
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