Bid to remove Kansas Supreme Court justices fails

Two justices will remain on the Kansas Supreme Court despite an effort to vote them off in response to rulings that overturned death sentences for two brothers in connection with four killings in Wichita.

Voters opted in Tuesday’s election to retain Justices Lee Johnson and Eric Rosen on the seven-member Supreme Court.

Johnson and Rosen were part of a Supreme Court majority in July that ordered new sentencing trials for Jonathan and Reginald Carr. They faced death for four shootings in a soccer field in December 2000.

Victims’ relatives started the removal effort.

Justices are appointed by the governor but must face voters every six years in a yes-or-no ballot question on whether each is retained.

Since the state began the system in 1960, no justice has been removed.