Death Penalty

Bill Would Change DNA Testing Procedures in Death Penalty Cases (Updated)

Veronica Zaragovia, KUT News and Laura Rice, KUT News — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 11:19:40 +0000

Update: A Texas Senate committee passed a bill last night that would require DNA testing of evidence in cases involving the death penalty.

The proposal will now go to the full senate for a vote.

Bill Would Make DNA Testing Mandatory in Death Penalty Cases

Veronica Zaragovia, KUT News — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 18:18:19 +0000

Some officials in Texas – including Attorney General Greg Abbott – want to change how the state handles DNA evidence.

Abbott says he thinks testing on DNA evidence should happen before a death penalty case goes to trial.

"If you’re innocent, you’re going to find out that your exoneration will come sooner," Abbott said. "If you are guilty, justice will be more swift and more certain."

Texas Executes First Death Row Inmate of 2013

Laura Rice, KUT News — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 14:27:07 +0000

The State of Texas executed 48 year-old Carl Blue Thursday night. He was put to death for killing his former girlfriend in 1994.

Blue was convicted of setting 38 year-old Carmen Richards-Sanders on fire at her Bryan apartment.

According to information on the Texas Department of Criminal Justice's death row website, Blue threw gasoline on Richards-Sanders when she opened the door to her apartment. He then ignited her clothes with a lighter. Blue also threw gasoline on a man in the apartment—who caught on fire when he tried to help Richards-Sanders.

The Lead: CPRIT-Funded Group Closes, County OKs Smoking Ban

KUT Staff — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 14:53:27 +0000

Good morning. The National Weather Service still has Central Texas under a Red Flag Warning until 6 p.m. tonight. The humidity will be low and the winds are high, meaning higher wildfire danger.

Austin’s in for otherwise nice weather today, with temperatures cooling to the 60s after this week’s warm streak.

Lead Story: The non-profit that got the biggest grant so far from the state’s troubled cancer-fighting agency is going out of business. The Clinical Trials Network of Texas says it has run out of money after the taxpayer-funded Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) began withholding payments.

The Lead: Abortion Protest at Texas Capitol, Single-Sex Schools Before AISD Board Tonight

KUT Staff — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 15:04:11 +0000

Good morning! With highs in the upper-70s, Austin’s in for a cloudy, breezy and muggy day, according to the National Weather Service.

Lead story: An anti-abortion protest converged on the State Capitol Saturday afternoon. Among the speakers at the “Texas Rally for Life:” Attorney General Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and Gov. Rick Perry, who said he was working to “make abortion in any stage a thing of the past.”

Willingham's Family Seeks "Posthumous Pardon"

Maurice Chammah, Texas Tribune — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 19:43:49 +0000

The surviving relatives of Cameron Todd Willingham gathered at the Capitol on Wednesday after sending an application to clear his name, 12 years after his execution for a 1991 fire that killed his three young children.

Texas Inmate Put to Death After Court Reverses Reprieve

Laura Rice, KUT News — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 11:04:24 +0000

Update: Thursday, Oct. 11, 6:04 a.m.:

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-minute appeal to spare Green from execution. Green received a lethal injection Wednesday night before 11 p.m. The warrant for his execution was set to expire at midnight.

Jonathan Green was the 10th inmate executed in Texas so far this year.

Original Story: Wednesday, Oct. 10, 4:13 p.m.:

A Texas death row inmate is once again facing execution this evening.

Jonathan Green’s execution was blocked on Monday when a federal judge ruled on Monday that due process was violated in Green’s competency hearing.

Could IQ Score Could Halt Texas Execution?

Laura Rice, KUT News — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 11:59:39 +0000

Update: Wilson was executed. The lower courts agreed with state lawyers that the results of the IQ test were faulty. The Supreme Court denied the request to stop the execution. Wilson was the seventh prisoner executed in Texas so far this year.

Earlier: Attorneys for a Texas man scheduled to die Tuesday evening are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the execution.

Marvin Wilson, 54, was convicted for the 1992 abduction and shooting death of a police informant – 21-year-old Jerry Williams – in Beaumont.

A psychological test found Wilson’s IQ was 61 – which defense lawyers say indicates mental impairment and makes him ineligible for execution. State lawyers argue that the test result was faulty and that all other tests showed his IQ above the impairment threshold of 70.

Texas Changing Its Lethal Injection Protocol

Brandi Grissom, Texas Tribune — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 22:24:25 +0000

Texas will join a handful of states that use a single drug in lethal injections, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice announced Tuesday.

State Backs DNA Testing for Hank Skinner

Brandi Grissom, Texas Tribune — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 21:29:30 +0000

Reversing its decade-long objection to testing that death row inmate Hank Skinner says could prove his innocence, the Texas Attorney General's office today filed an advisory with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals seeking to test DNA in the case.

"Upon further consideration, the State believes that the interest of justice would best be served by DNA testing the evidence requested by Skinner and by testing additional items identified by the state," lawyers for the state wrote in the advisory.

Skinner, now 50, was convicted in 1995 of the strangulation and beating death of his girlfriend Twila Busby and the stabbing deaths of her two adult sons on New Year’s Eve 1993 in Pampa. Skinner maintains he is innocent and was unconscious on the couch at the time of the killings, intoxicated from a mixture of vodka and codeine.

AM Update: Texans Support Death Penalty, Summer Film Series Starts, Cattle Loose on Dallas Freeway

Sam J. Ellison and Laura Rice, KUT News — Thu, 24 May 2012 12:29:38 +0000

Poll Finds Most Texans Support the Death Penalty

A University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll shows that a majority of Texans support the death penalty.

The poll found 73 percent of respondents were strongly or somewhat supportive, while 21 percent were somewhat or strongly opposed. Five percent were unsure.

According to the poll, 51 percent of Texans believe the death penalty is fairly applied. Some 28 percent disagree, and 21 percent were unsure.

Questions About Another Texas Execution: Was Wrong Man Condemned?

Mark Memmott, NPR — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:27:14 +0000

Already in the spotlight over whether it executed one innocent man — Cameron Todd Willingham — in 2004, the state of Texas now faces questions about whether another man may have been wrongly condemned to death.

Columbia Law School's Columbia Human Rights Law Review has posted online a 400-page, multi-media investigation that concludes it was mistake to have put Carlos DeLuna to death in 1989 for the murder

Supreme Court Declines Texas Death Row Case of Duane Buck

Nina Totenberg, NPR — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 16:34:01 +0000

The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear the case of Texas death row inmate Duane Buck, who alleged that race played an improper role in his death sentence. In September, the court issued a rare stay of execution while it considered the merits of the case. Monday's action lifts the stay and allows the state to set a new execution date.

In 1995, Buck, who is African-American, was convicted of killing two people and shooting a third. During the sentencing phase of his trial, psychologist Walter Quijano was called by the defense.

Prosecutors Concede Morton Did Not Murder His Wife

Brandi Grissom, Texas Tribune — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 18:52:22 +0000

Michael Morton, who served 25 years in prison for the murder of his wife Christine, will be released after his attorneys reached an agreement with prosecutors, who said today in a legal filing that Morton was not his wife's killer.

Prosecutors conceded that there is evidence of Morton's "actual innocence."