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GLOSSIP v. GROSS BREYER, J., dissenting

be) unconstitutional if “inflicted in an arbitrary and capri­ cious manner.” Gregg, 428 U. S., at 188 (joint opinion of Stewart, Powell, and Stevens, JJ.); see also id., at 189 (“[W]here discretion is afforded a sentencing body on a matter so grave as the determination of whether a human life should be taken or spared, that discretion must be suitably directed and limited so as to minimize the risk of wholly arbitrary and capricious action”); Godfrey v. Geor­ gia, 446 U. S. 420, 428 (1980) (plurality opinion) (similar). The Court has consequently sought to make the applica­ tion of the death penalty less arbitrary by restricting its use to those whom Justice Souter called “ ‘the worst of the worst.’ ” Kansas v. Marsh, 548 U. S., at 206 (dissenting opinion); see also Roper v. Simmons, 543 U. S. 551, 568 (2005) (“Capital punishment must be limited to those offenders who commit a narrow category of the most seri­ ous crimes and whose extreme culpability makes them the most deserving of execution” (internal quotation marks omitted)); Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U. S. 407, 420 (2008) (citing Roper, supra, at 568). Despite the Gregg Court’s hope for fair administration of the death penalty, 40 years of further experience make it increasingly clear that the death penalty is imposed arbi­ trarily, i.e., without the “reasonable consistency” legally necessary to reconcile its use with the Constitution’s commands. Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U. S. 104, 112 (1982). Thorough studies of death penalty sentences support this conclusion. A recent study, for example, examined all death penalty sentences imposed between 1973 and 2007 in Connecticut, a State that abolished the death penalty in 2012. Donohue, An Empirical Evaluation of the Connecti­ cut Death Penalty System Since 1973: Are There Unlawful Racial, Gender, and Geographic Disparities? 11 J. Empiri­ cal Legal Studies 637 (2014). The study reviewed treat­ ment of all homicide defendants. It found 205 instances in