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Thread: Texas Capital Punishment News

  1. #11
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    Shortage forces Texas to switch execution drug

    Texas is changing one of the drugs it uses to conduct executions in the country's busiest death penalty state because of a shortage of a drug it's used for nearly two decades.

    Texas Department of Criminal Justice officials said Wednesday that they plan to substitute pentobarbital for sodium thiopental in the three-drug cocktail used for lethal injections.

    A shortage of sodium thiopental has forced multiple states to scramble to find substitutes. Texas has used the drug since becoming the first state to do lethal injections in 1982. The Texas supply of sodium thiopental expires at the end of this month and an execution is set for early April.

    Prison agency spokeswoman Michelle Lyons says the new drug has been used for executions in Oklahoma and has survived court challenges there.

    http://www.dallasnews.com/news/state...ution-drug.ece

  2. #12
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    Two bills in House would end death penalty in Tx

    Two new bills filed in theTexas House of Representatives this session would completely eliminate the death penalty.

    Lawmakers say whether you're for it or against it housing death row inmates is just too expensive.

    Texas leads the nation in the number of executions since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.

    314 inmates are currently on death row in Texas.

    According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice on average the cost to house an inmate is around $37.03 a day versus the $49.54 a day is costs for a death row inmate.

    Representative Jessica Farrar has filed one of the two bills this session that would eliminate the death penalty altogether.

    http://www.ketknbc.com/news/two-bill...-penalty-in-tx

  3. #13
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    House Panel Considers Bills on Death Penalty

    AUSTIN, Texas (AP) State lawmakers are considering bills to change the state death penalty and alter procedures in capital felony cases.

    One proposal before a state House committee Tuesday would create a commission to study capital punishment and suspend the death sentence until it completes its study.

    The committee will also hear testimony on a proposal to amend state law to allow defendants to have separate trials if both are being tried for a capital felony.

    A statute known as the law of parties allows a person to be tried for a capital offense and possibly face the death penalty even if they didn't physically commit the crime. The bill authored by state Rep. Harold Dutton, D-Houston, would prohibit death sentences in such cases.

    http://www2.wnct.com/news/2011/mar/2...lty-ar-902373/

  4. #14
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    Death-penalty trigger increase gets OK

    Legislation that would raise the age from 6 to 10 for which a child killer can be charged with the death penalty was approved this morning by the Texas Senate.

    Senate Bill 377 by state Sen. Joan Huffman, R-Houston, would bring Texas closer in line with other states, most of which have age 12 as the age-based trigger for capital murder charges.

    If victims are under that age, a murderer can be more readily charged with capital murder.

    For several years, Texas has had the youngest age — at 6.

    Huffman said the change “brings in ages 6, 7, 8 and 9 who have been murdered and makes it a capital crime to murder children those ages,” she said.

    A Houston case highlighted the need for the change, other senators said.

    The measure now goes to the House for consideration.

    http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte..._increase.html

  5. #15
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    Senate Approves Easing Restrictions on DNA Testing

    Prisoners in Texas may get easier access to post-conviction DNA testing to prove their innocence. The Senate today passed a bill today that would reduce restrictions on post-conviction DNA testing by allowing biological evidence that was previously untested, or tested by older, potentially inaccurate techniques, to be tested and used as evidence in court.

    "SB 122 will ensure that if there is DNA evidence available to prove someone's innocence, it can and will be tested," Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, author of the bill, said in a statement. "No longer will the door to justice be shut just because of a procedural error."

    Existing law limits post-conviction DNA testing. An inmate can only get testing if at the time of conviction DNA testing was unavailable, if the technology was incapable of providing adequate results, or if the DNA was not tested by “no fault of the convicted person.”

    If DNA testing is used to exonerate a prisoner, the bill also has a provision requiring the DNA profile to be compared to the federal CODIS DNA database to help find the actual perpetrator.

    The bill could have serious implications for prisoners who claim DNA evidence could prove their innocence, like Hank Skinner, a death row inmate who recently won a U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing him to pursue post-conviction DNA testing in federal court. Ellis said DNA testing would help Texas identify innocent death row inmates before they are executed.

    Ellis also cited the case of Ricardo Rachell, a man exonerated by post-conviction DNA testing in Harris County. After being physically disfigured by a shotgun wound to the face, Rachell was falsely accused of sexually assaulting an 8-year-old boy. He served six years of a 40-year sentence before DNA testing proved he was innocent.

    http://www.texastribune.org/texas-le...n-dna-testing/

  6. #16
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    The death row inmates evaluated by Dr. George Denkowski included, from left to right, Michael Richard, John Matamoros, Coy Wesbrook and Steven Butler. Mr. Richard was executed.


    Psychologist Who Cleared Death Row Inmates Is Reprimanded

    A psychologist who examined 14 inmates who are now on Texas’ Death Row — and two others who were subsequently executed — and found them intellectually competent enough to face the death penalty, agreed on Thursday never to perform such evaluations again. Lawyers for the 14 inmates hope the agreement will help their clients, who they argue are mentally handicapped, to escape lethal injection.

    As part of a settlement, the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists issued a reprimand against Dr. George Denkowski, whose testing methods have been sharply criticized by other psychologists and defense lawyers as unscientific. Dr. Denkowski agreed not to conduct intellectual disability evaluations in future criminal cases and to pay a fine of $5,500. In return, the board dismissed the complaints against him.

    Texas defense lawyers and forensic psychologists across the nation have watched the case closely. Although Dr. Denkowski admitted no wrongdoing and defends his practice, those critical of his methods said the settlement could give those inmates still on death row an important appellate opportunity.

    “It really suggests that he screwed up,” said Dick Burr, a lawyer who represents Steven Butler, a death row inmate, and who filed one of the complaints against Dr. Denkowski.

    The United States Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that states cannot execute mentally handicapped people. But the court did not provide guidelines for determining whether a person is mentally handicapped, leaving it up to the states to create criteria. Texas courts have generally adopted a three-part definition that requires the convicted inmate to have below-average intellectual function, to lack adaptive behavior skills and to have had these problems since a young age.

    Dr. Denkowski was an expert witness whom prosecutors — particularly in Harris County — relied upon to determine whether a murder defendant would be eligible for execution. In 2009, other psychologists and defense lawyers complained to the board of psychologist examiners that Dr. Denkowski used unscientific methods that artificially inflated intelligence scores to make defendants eligible for the death penalty.

    Dr. Denkowski published a 2008 article in the American Journal of Forensic Psychology describing his technique for scoring defendants. He said traditional tests did not compensate for social and cultural factors. For example, he wrote, those who come from impoverished backgrounds may not have learned basic skills like using a thermometer or maintaining hygiene simply because those skills were not valued in their community. But that does not necessarily indicate a lack of intellectual function, he said.

    Dr. Denkowski also explained why he deviated from the standard use of a test that evaluates adaptive behavior or life skills. The test is typically administered to family members and friends who know the person to ask about how the person functions — whether he is able to pay rent, fill out job applications, read menus, etc.

    Dr. Denkowski administered that test to the inmate instead. People close to the individual, he wrote, “tend to understate a defendant’s actual functioning markedly” because they do not want him to face execution.

    Other psychologists have rejected Dr. Denkowski’s methods, arguing that they have no scientific basis. The American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in its 2010 manual for classifying intellectual disability strongly cautioned against using Dr. Denkowski’s methods “until firmly supported by empirical evidence.”

    “What Denkowski has been doing is a pretty radical departure,” said Marc J. Tassé, director of the Ohio State University Nisonger Center and an expert in developmental disabilities. “There’s absolutely no scientific basis to his procedure.”

    There is no evidence, Dr. Tassé said, that a person from a poor family is less likely to learn basic life skills. He said he knew of no other forensic psychologist who uses similar methods.

    Jennifer Andrews, Dr. Denkowski’s lawyer, said her client vigorously denied that he violated any psychology board rules. Part of the problem, Ms. Andrews said, is that the board has not promulgated specific rules for conducting forensic evaluations for cases involving mentally handicapped individuals.

    “Psychologists are left to use their best clinical judgment, which Dr. Denkowski used,” she said.

    In 2007, Mark Ellis, a state district judge, concluded in the case of the death row inmate Daniel Plata that Dr. Denkowski’s methods did not align with accepted psychological practices and ethical guidelines. Judge Ellis threw out the 2005 evaluation by Dr. Denkowski, saying it “must be disregarded due to fatal errors in ... administration and scoring.”

    Mr. Plata’s sentence was commuted to life in 2008, and he is now at the Hodge Unit with other similarly disabled prisoners.

    In a 2006 evaluation of Steven Butler, who was convicted in the killing of a store clerk, Dr. Denkowski rejected other I.Q. test scores that indicated Mr. Butler was well below average intelligence. He discounted behavioral evaluations from Mr. Butler’s family and friends, who said the young man could not understand the rules of basketball, had to have others read menus for him and had failed basic classes.

    The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has stayed Mr. Butler’s execution pending the outcome of the complaint against Dr. Denkowski.

    A clause in the settlement asserts that the agreement cannot be cited in capital punishment appeals, but Mr. Burr said he plans to use it — and Dr. Denkowski’s agreement not to conduct forensic evaluations again — to argue that Mr. Butler should be re-evaluated to ensure that Texas does not execute a mentally handicapped man.

    State Senator Rodney Ellis, Democrat of Houston, chairman of the Innocence Project board and a member of the Criminal Justice Committee, said every case involving Dr. Denkowski should be reviewed by the courts.

    “We cannot simply shrug our shoulders and sit by and watch while the state uses legal technicalities to execute these intellectually disabled men,” Mr. Ellis said, “especially on the word of someone who is no longer permitted to make these kinds of determinations.”

    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/15/us...1&pagewanted=2

  7. #17
    Senior Member CnCP Legend JLR's Avatar
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    If I'm right, Matamoros has an appeal filed in the 5th Circuit and Wesbrook got denied by the Supremes. A lot of these guys will file appeals in various courts and the whole process could start again. We could be looking at a flurry of commutations and delays as we go through various courts.


    Also, couldn't Butler and Matamoros use Penry claims? They were convicted in the 80's/early 90's.

  8. #18
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    Also, couldn't Butler and Matamoros use Penry claims? They were convicted in the 80's/early 90's.
    Most attorneys will file if they can get testimony from family members on abuse and they can get a hold of school records that actually show some level of retardation.

  9. #19
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    Exoneree law changes approved

    A bill that would allow for exonerated death row prisoner Anthony Graves to receive compensation for being wrongly locked up for 18 years for a crime he did not commit was approved this afternoon by the Texas Senate.

    State Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, said House Bill 417, of which he is the Senate sponsor, would allow for Graves to receive $80,000 a year for each year he was falsely incarcerated, after his high-profile request for compensation was denied by Comptroller Susan Combs because of a technicality.

    The court order that exonerated him did not include the words “actual innocence.”

    Ellis said Graves spent 18 years behind bars on murder charges, 12 of them on death row.

    Ellis said the bill also allows exonerated convicts to get health insurance through the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, for the same period which they were locked up. The exonerees will pay for their insurance.

    In addition, the legislation establishes new procedures for informing exonerated convicts of their rights and the process for applying for state compensation — a move designed to prevent attorneys from charging too much in fees.

    A Texas attorney was recently criticized for collecting $1 million from an exoneree, in a case that Ellis called “outrageous.”

    Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, blasted the case as highlighting the need for a cap on attorneys fees in exoneration cases. He also questioned why exonerees should need attorneys at all, if the state procedures are clear.

    “I am angry at this attorney. I see it as theft,” Patrick said.

    Ellis said that to cap attorneys fees would require additional work and negotiations. He said the bill was agreed to by the offices of the governor, attorney general and comptroller.

    With several exonerees sitting in the Senate gallery, the Senate voted to approve the bill with one dissenting vote.

    http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...logs_postcards

  10. #20
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    Eyewitness ID bill gets final OK

    The Texas Senate this afternoon unanimously approved a bill that will impose new eyewitness identification procedures for police departments across Texas, a key reform recommended to prevent wrongful convictions.

    House Bill 215, sponsored by Senator Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, and Rep. Pete Gallego, D-Alpine, requires all police agencies in the state to adopt written eyewitness identification policies based on proven best practices by September 2012.

    Ellis said the bill “enacts a simple best practice to ensure we have reliable evidence in our courtrooms to ensure the conviction of the guilty and the protection of the innocent.

    He called its passage “an important step toward improving justice in Texas."

    According to the national Innocence Project, approximately 75 percent of the 266 exonerations in the United States have been due to eyewitness misidentification.

    In Texas, 38 of its 44 DNA wrongful convictions — 86 percent — were largely or exclusively due to incorrect eyewitness identifications, statistics show.

    Ellis said that even though certain “best practices” have been shown to improve the accuracy and reliability of eyewitness evidence, the Justice Project found in November 2008 that only 12 percent of police departments in Texas even have written policies or guidelines for conducting lineups.

    Texas has had 44 DNA exonerations, more than any other state. Nationally, 266 men have been exonerated through DNA. The Senate passed a Senate version of HB 215 in March, and a similar bill 2 years ago.

    The bill now goes to the governor to be signed into law.

    (source: Austin American-Statesman)

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