Moore v. Texas: The Supreme Court Presses States to Comport with the Evolving Medical Understanding of Intellectual Disability

Last week, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Moore v. Texas, the third major case the Court has decided about intellectual disability (formerly, mental retardation) and the death penalty. This post summarizes the case and considers its impact on North Carolina. Background. In 1980, Moore and two other men decided to rob a grocery store. Shortly after they entered, Moore shot a clerk in the head and the men fled. Moore was apprehended, charged with capital murder, convicted, and sentenced to death. He later alleged that he was intellectually disabled and so ineligible for the death penalty under Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002) (ruling that the Eighth Amendment precludes the execution of the intellectually disabled) and its progeny. A state habeas court agreed, applying the criteria that are currently used in the mental health community, such as those contained in the AAIDD-11, a manual published by the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, and the DSM-V. Those standards require an IQ score of approximately 70 or below, accounting for measurement error; “adaptive deficits”; and onset before age 18. The court credited six IQ tests, with an average score of 70.66, and, relying on expert testimony, found that Moore suffered adaptive deficits in each of three areas recognized in the literature: conceptual, social, and practical functioning. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled otherwise, concluding that precedent required the lower court to apply the intellectual disability standards set forth in Ex parte Briseno, 135 S.W. 3d 1 [...]