Jindal to challenge new SC ruling on child-rape death penalty

Houston, Jul 5 (PTI) - Indian-American Governor of
Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, is hogging U.S. media headlines as he
mulls challenging a recent controversial Supreme Court ruling
forbidding the death penalty in child-rape cases.

The Supreme Court's June 25 decision said there was no
legal precedent for the death penalty, but the court neglected
to consider a 2006 federal law that says the rape of children
by military personnel could attract capital punishment.

Attorneys for the state of Louisiana and the Justice
Department made the same oversight in petitions they filed
with the federal courts, the 'Washington Times' reported.

Jindal, 37, supposed to be a leading contender as the
running mate of presumptive Republican presidential nominee
John McCain, said he has spoken with lawyers who represented
the state "and have encouraged them both to seriously review
these new facts and consider petitioning the court for a
rehearing."

The case involved a man who was convicted of brutally
raping his 8-year-old stepdaughter. A jury decided he should
get the death penalty under a 1995 state law.

Five other U.S. states also allow the death penalty for
child-rape. Those laws were invalidated by the recent Supreme
Court ruling, the report said.

"The Supreme Court got this case wrong, plain and
simple," Jindal said.

The U.S. Justice Department has no plans to independently
ask the Supreme Court to hear the case again.

"Only parties to a case may petition for rehearing," the
Justice Department said in a statement while acknowledging
that its attorneys mistakenly failed to consider the National
Defence Authorisation Act for Fiscal Year 2006 in its legal
briefs.

Although the law applies only to military personnel, the
Supreme Court has not decided whether it could set a precedent
to execute civilians who rape children.

"Although no one has been sentenced to death for child
rape under the law, we note with regard to the continued
constitutionality of the law that the Supreme Court has not
resolved the question whether its Eighth Amendment
jurisprudence applies with equal force in the context of
military capital punishment," the Justice Department statement
said.

After the Supreme Court ruling last week, Jindal said he
would seek to enact laws to override the decision.

The 5-4 decision written by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
said the Eighth Amendment would forbid the death penalty for
raping a child as "cruel and unusual punishment."

The Eighth Amendment "requires that resort to capital
punishment be restrained, limited in its instances of
application and reserved for the worst of crimes, those that,
in the case of crimes against individuals, take the victim's
life," the decision said.

The Supreme Court's ruling was denounced by the Bush
administration as well as presumptive presidential nominees
McCain and Barack Obama, a Democrat.

Jindal has been in the news of late. On Monday, he had
vetoed a bill that would have doubled the salaries of state
legislators.

The pay raise had infuriated voters, leading some to file
"recall petitions" against the governor and two of his top
allies in the Legislature.

Jindal also vetoed two more bills on Tuesday that would
affect those filing ethics complaints against public
officials. PTI