Roberts Casts Swing Vote for Death Row Inmate With Dementia (3)

A death row inmate battling dementia won his execution appeal at the U.S. Supreme Court Feb. 27 in a 5-3 decision, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joining the four Democratic-appointed justices to rule for the inmate.

It was Roberts’ latest instance of joining his more liberal colleagues, which has put him in the spotlight after the retirement of swing-vote Anthony M. Kennedy last summer.

The death row inmate Vernon Madison argued it would violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment to execute him, because he says he can’t remember committing the murder that landed ...