Moore v. Texas
The Supreme Court reversed the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals for a second time, ruling that the court had again relied on outdated stereotypes and flawed reasoning when it found Bobby James Moore was not intellectually disabled and could be executed.
The Court held that, based on the trial record, Moore has shown he is intellectually disabled and therefore cannot be sentenced to death under the Eighth Amendment's ban on executing people with intellectual disability.
“We consequently agree with Moore and the prosecutor that, on the basis of the trial court record, Moore has shown he is a person with intellectual disability.”
The Court's ultimate conclusion that Moore is intellectually disabled and ineligible for execution.
How it got here: After the Supreme Court vacated an earlier ruling against Moore in 2017 and sent the case back, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals again found him not intellectually disabled, and Moore again sought Supreme Court review.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Bobby James Moore was sentenced to death in Texas. He argued he could not be executed because he has intellectual disability, which the Supreme Court's 2002 Atkins decision says makes a person ineligible for the death penalty. A Texas trial court agreed after hearing extensive evidence, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals repeatedly disagreed, finding Moore eligible for execution.
The question before the Court
After the Supreme Court sent his case back, did Texas's top criminal court still get it wrong when it again found Bobby Moore not intellectually disabled and eligible for execution?
Why it matters
Bobby Moore, who has spent decades on death row, cannot be executed because the Court found he is intellectually disabled. The decision also signals to Texas and other states that courts must actually apply current medical standards—rather than lay stereotypes—when deciding whether a death-row inmate is protected from execution.
What changes now
This is a final merits ruling, not a temporary order. The case goes back to the Texas courts, but the Supreme Court has already determined, based on the existing trial record, that Moore has shown he is intellectually disabled. That finding forecloses further litigation over his eligibility for execution on that basis.
What this does not decide
The Court did not lay out a fully precise, general rule for how courts should weigh adaptive strengths versus deficits in every future case—a gap the concurrence and dissent both noted. It ruled narrowly that, on this specific record, Moore has shown intellectual disability.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Roberts
Chief Justice Roberts, who had dissented from the Court's 2017 ruling and still believes its guidance is unclear, agreed that the Texas court plainly misapplied that guidance here by repeating the same errors—improperly relying on the discredited Briseno factors and overemphasizing Moore's adaptive strengths instead of his deficits. He joined the reversal on that narrower basis.
Dissent — Justice Alito
“The Court's foray into factfinding is an unsound departure from our usual practice.”Alito's objection that the Court improperly acted as a fact-finder rather than sending the case back for a clearer standard.
Justice Alito, joined by Justices Thomas and Gorsuch, argued the Texas court's errors stemmed from the 2017 opinion's own lack of a clear standard, not from defiance of it. He objected that the Court was improperly acting as a fact-finder rather than a reviewing court, and that it should instead have vacated the ruling, articulated a clear rule, and remanded for the state court to apply it. He would have denied review entirely.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court applied the three clinical criteria for intellectual disability it had already endorsed in the 2017 ruling: significant deficits in intellectual functioning, significant deficits in adaptive functioning (day-to-day life skills), and onset of these problems before adulthood.
- The Court compared the Texas appeals court's new opinion against the specific errors it had identified in 2017, checking whether the same problems recurred even if described in different words.
- It found the appeals court again focused on Moore's apparent strengths—such as skills he developed after years in the highly structured environment of prison—rather than on his documented deficits, repeating a mistake the Court had already flagged as inconsistent with accepted clinical practice.
- It found the appeals court had said it would stop using the outdated 'Briseno' factors—an unofficial checklist Texas courts had used that relied on lay stereotypes rather than medical standards—but that the substance of its reasoning still tracked those factors closely.
- Because the flawed reasoning ran through nearly every part of the appeals court's adaptive-functioning analysis, the Court concluded that removing it left too little support for a finding that Moore lacked intellectual disability, so the trial court's original finding of intellectual disability should stand.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Atkins v. Virginia (536 U.S. 304)
The Court relies on Atkins' rule that executing intellectually disabled people violates the Eighth Amendment.
Reaffirms Hall v. Florida (572 U.S. 701)
The Court repeats Hall's requirement that disability determinations be guided by medical, not lay, standards.
Reaffirms Moore v. Texas (137 S.Ct. 1039)
The Court applies and enforces the standards it set in its own 2017 ruling in this same case.