CHICAGO, May 21, 2025 — The American Bar Association filed an amicus brief today with the Supreme Court of Nevada, arguing that the capital sentence in the case of Robert Ybarra Jr., who has been on death row in Nevada since 1981, should be reversed.
The brief, filed in support of Ybarra’s appeal, argues that those suffering from severe mental illness at the time of their crimes should not be executed.
“United States Supreme Court precedent compels the conclusion that individuals suffering from severe mental illness at the time of their crimes should not face execution,” the brief says, noting that the court already has exempted intellectually disabled individuals and juveniles from execution “based on their diminished culpability and the heighted risk of unfair proceedings.”
The brief also outlines three policy considerations for the court’s review:
- Executing the severely mentally ill serves neither retribution nor deterrence.
- Severe mental illness jeopardizes the reliability and fairness of capital proceedings.
- Emerging professional and legislative consensus is that executing the severely mentally ill is wrong.
In its brief, the ABA outlines its extensive work to improve the administration of the death penalty in the justice system.
“Although the ABA takes no position on the death penalty, it has long insisted that capital punishment be administered fairly, with robust substantive and procedural protections,” the brief says. “The association has conducted extensive studies and adopted numerous policies on the application of the death penalty to vulnerable populations,” including through work by the ABA Death Penalty Representation Project.
The ABA brief in Robert Ybarra, Jr. v. Terry Royal, Warden, Ely State Prison is here. Daniel Woofter of the law firm Russell & Woofter LLC together with local counsel Kyle E. N. George filed the brief pro bono on behalf of the ABA.
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