State of Arizona, Appellee v. Scott Douglas Nordstrom, Appellant

Summary

The court affirmed Nordstrom’s death sentences after concluding that the resentencing court properly admitted evidence concerning his other murders, parole status, and the crime scenes, while properly excluding evidence offered solely to establish residual doubt. The court also held that the resentencing proceedings did not permit collateral attacks on previously affirmed convictions, did not violate double jeopardy, and properly allowed contemporaneous convictions to establish the statutory prior-conviction aggravator. After independently reviewing aggravation and mitigation, the court found the death sentences appropriate because the aggravating circumstance was proven beyond a reasonable doubt and the mitigation was not sufficiently substantial to warrant leniency.