Delo v. Lashley

Per Curiam.*

I

Respondent Frederick Lashley brutally beat and stabbed to death his 55-year-old, physically impaired cousin and foster mother, Janie Tracy, in the course of robbing her. An *273adult in the eyes of Missouri law at age 17, Lashley was convicted of capital murder, Mo. Rev. Stat. §565.001 (1978) (repealed Oct. 1, 1984), and sentenced to death. At a conference preceding the penalty phase of the trial, one of Lashley’s attorneys asked the judge to instruct the jury on the mitigating circumstance that “[t]he defendant ha[d] no significant history of prior criminal activity,” Mo. Rev. Stat.…