Early report on Bies oral argument

As noted here, the Supreme Court this morning heard oral argument in Bobby v. Bies, one of the very few capital cases on the SCOTUS docket this term.  This early AP report suggests I was right to predict that the Justices are likely to give Ohio another bite at the death penalty apple in this case:

The Supreme Court appears likely to give Ohio another chance to sentence a convicted killer to death, despite a previous finding that the man is mentally retarded. The high court heard oral arguments Monday in the case of Michael Bies, who was convicted of killing a 10-year-old boy in Cincinnati in 1992.

Several of the court’s liberal justices seemed to agree with the state’s argument that Bies never received a proper hearing on his mental state because he was sentenced years before the high court barred the execution of the mentally disabled.

The full oral argument transcript can be found at this link.

UPDATE:  The first sentence of Adam Liptak’s report here in the New York Times about the Bies argument captures the tone and spirit of what transpired during oral argument:

It does not bode well for a death row inmate when his lawyer must spend the bulk of a Supreme Court argument fending off combative questions from two of the court’s most liberal justices.