USA - California. Court of Appeals overturned Brett Pensinger’s death sentence.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Brett Pensinger’s death sentence. The Court has upheld a 2012 district judge’s reversal of a death sentence because of an error in instructing the jury about so-called special circumstances that enable capital punishment. In 1981, the 19-year-old Pensinger kidnapped a San Bernardino infant and her brother. The brother was dropped off unharmed, but the infant was found murdered and mutilated. Pensinger was subsequently convicted of murder, with a kidnapping and torture enhancement, and sentenced to death in San Bernardino County on September 20, 1982 for the August 4, 1981 murder of 5-month-old Michelle Melander, whose mutilated body was found a year earlier. Today’s complex ruling doesn’t affect the convictions.