## Facts

- Thomas Eugene Creech, an Idaho prison inmate already serving life sentences, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for killing a fellow inmate.
- The state trial judge imposed the death penalty under Idaho’s capital sentencing scheme.
- In sentencing, the judge found an Idaho statutory aggravating circumstance satisfied: that Creech “exhibited utter disregard for human life.”
- On direct review, the Idaho Supreme Court affirmed the death sentence and applied its earlier limiting interpretation that “utter disregard” refers to the “cold-blooded, pitiless slayer.”
- Creech sought federal habeas relief, arguing the aggravator was unconstitutionally vague under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.
- The federal district court denied relief, but the Ninth Circuit held the aggravator facially vague and set aside the sentence on that ground.

## Issues

1. Whether Idaho’s “utter disregard for human life” aggravating circumstance is unconstitutionally vague under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.
2. Whether Idaho’s limiting construction—restricting the aggravator to the “cold-blooded, pitiless slayer”—provides sufficiently clear and objective guidance to channel sentencing discretion.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit.
- The Court upheld the “utter disregard for human life” aggravator as constitutionally valid when applied with the Idaho Supreme Court’s settled limiting construction.
- The Court concluded the “cold-blooded, pitiless slayer” definition meaningfully narrows the class of offenders eligible for the death penalty and permits rational review.
- The Court rejected the view that focusing on the offender’s attitude or state of mind makes the aggravator too subjective to satisfy the Eighth Amendment.
- Creech’s death sentence was not set aside on vagueness grounds.

## Legal Principles

- A capital sentencing scheme must channel the sentencer’s discretion through clear and objective standards that provide guidance and allow rational review under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.
- An aggravating circumstance that is broad on its face may be upheld if state courts have adopted a consistent, narrowing construction that meaningfully limits its reach.
- In evaluating an aggravator, courts consider: (1) whether the statutory language is vague; (2) whether state courts have narrowed it; and (3) whether the narrowing definition provides sufficient guidance.
- A narrowing construction may permissibly focus on the defendant’s attitude or disposition toward the victim and the killing; such mental-state determinations may be inferred from circumstances and need not be reducible to purely historical facts.
- A sentencing-stage aggravator may add a constitutionally relevant limitation beyond the elements of first-degree murder, even if it involves evaluative judgment.

## Conclusion

The Supreme Court held that Idaho’s “utter disregard for human life” aggravating circumstance is not unconstitutionally vague when applied under the Idaho Supreme Court’s settled construction limiting it to the “cold-blooded, pitiless slayer,” and it reinstated the validity of Creech’s death sentence against that facial vagueness challenge.


Arave v. Creech, 507 U.S. 463 (1993)