Sotomayor Says Supreme Court Wrongly Allowed Man’s Execution

The Supreme Court wrongly allowed the Wednesday execution of a Mississippi man convicted of raping and murdering a college student, the court’s liberal justices said in a lengthy dissent.

The court should have paused Charles Ray Crawford’s execution and granted his petition for certiorari, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a 13-page dissent that was joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

Crawford’s Sixth Amendment rights were likely violated because his counsel repeatedly told the jury and said at all stages of his trial that he killed the victim, Kristy Ray, against his explicit instructions, the dissent said.

Crawford argued on appeal that McCoy v. Louisiana, the 2018 decision that held lawyers can’t override defendants’ clear decision not to concede guilt at trial, should have applied retroactively to his case. The issue implicates a circuit split and the court should have paused it and granted a petition for certiorari, Sotomayor said.

Crawford “has identified an important constitutional issue that this Court has not addressed and has divided courts around the country,” Sotomayor said. “The Court refuses to resolve that question, even though a man’s life is in the balance.”

The state argued Crawford, who was convicted for kidnapping, raping, and stabbing Ray to death, filed an untimely and successive petition under state law, and the US Supreme Court lacked jurisdiction. It also said Crawford’s attorneys argued for his acquittal using an insanity defense.

Sotomayor called the acquittal argument “hair-splitting,” saying it would have resulted in the denial of Crawford’s right to argue his innocence rather than seek a technical acquittal.

Crawford likely would’ve received a new trial if his case had gone to the Supreme Court on direct appeal, Sotomayor said. He had a strong argument that McCoy doesn’t apply a new rule within the Sixth Amendment landscape and his rights were violated at trial, she wrote.

“Crawford will be sent to his death without ever having had a real opportunity to hold the State to its burden of proving his guilt,” Sotomayor said.

Crawford was executed by lethal injection Wednesday and pronounced dead at 6:15 pm, the Associated Press reported.

The case is Crawford v. Mississippi, U.S., No. 25-385, 10/15/25,