Wainwright v. Adams

Justice Marshall, with whom Justice Brennan joins,

dissenting.

Yesterday, May 8, 1984, a majority of a panel of the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit stayed the impending execution of James Adams. The Court of Appeals concluded that Adams’ petition for federal habeas corpus relief presents the same issues that are currently pending before the Court of Appeals in Spencer v. Zant, 715 F. 2d 1562, vacated for rehearing en banc, 715 F. 2d 1583 (1983), and McCleskey v. Zant, No. 84-8176 (to be argued in June 1984), and that “the en banc cases [now] pending in the Eleventh Circuit require a…