Supreme Court Stays Virginia Execution

A Virginia man facing execution for the 1992 murder of a convenience store clerk won a reprieve from the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday, hours before he was scheduled to be put to death.

The court stayed the execution of Bobby Lee Ramdass, 28, while it weighs whether to formally consider appeals arguing in part that jurors should have been told he could have instead been sentenced to life without parole. Ramdass had been sentenced to die for shooting a 7-Eleven clerk in the head after the man was unable to open a store safe during an early morning robbery in Fairfax, Va.

After finding Ramdass guilty, the jury in his capital murder trial asked the trial judge whether he would be eligible for parole if he were sentenced to life in prison. The judge, in accordance with state law at the time, told the jury that was not something they should consider, and they later recommended a death sentence.

Defense attorneys in the Supreme Court appeal argued that the jury should have been told that Ramdass would not have been eligible for parole because of his criminal record, and they asked that his sentence be commuted to life in prison.