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Criminal Law

StandDown Texas Project

Texas-centric examination of conditions, reform initiatives, and emerging issues related to best practices in the indigent criminal justice system with particular attention to issues involving capital punishment and the administration of the death penalty.
By StandDown Texas Project

Post Frequency: 49.3/day

Last Entry: April 01, 2011 at 14:21:29

Peggy Fikac's Latest Column

Posted on December 13, 2010
The Houston Chronicle / San Antonio Express-News columnist and reporter's latest column is, "Trimming budget with empty benches." It addresses two different issues of interest. First, the CCA and the state budget. Texas is facing an estimated $28 billion shortfall...

Justice Stevens and the Death Penalty

Posted on December 13, 2010
That's the title of a New York Times editorial. It appeared in the Sunday edition. In the current "New York Review of Books," the retired Justice John Paul Stevens makes a compelling argument for abolishing the death penalty. He explains...

Dallas Morning News Editorial on the Harris County Hearing

Posted on December 13, 2010
"Death penalty debate needs forum," is the title of a Dallas Morning News editorial. It appeared in the Saturday edition. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals did the right thing when it put a stop to a Houston court's flawed...

High Cost of Executions

Posted on December 10, 2010
That's the title of an OpEd by Chuck Arnold in today's Lompoc Record of California. He's the pastor at Valley of the Flowers United Church of Christ. In the late 1950s, I was working as a correctional officer (guard) at...

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Eric Zorn on the Illinois Death Penalty

Posted on December 10, 2010
The Chicago Tribune columnist has a lengthy post at his Trib blog, "Old case sheds new light on the death penalty debate." A man posing as a neighbor needing to borrow a plunger raped a 29-year-old woman in her living...

In Their Own Defense

Posted on December 10, 2010
That's the title of an editorial in today's Washington Post on the state of indigent defense. LAURENCE H. TRIBE has left the Justice Department, last weekbut the mission he was tapped to lead - broadening and strengthening legal services for...

Lethal Injection Roundup

Posted on December 10, 2010
First, more reporting on the California FOIA document release -- this from Rina Palta at KALW-FM's Informant, "Timeline: California?s scramble for execution drugs." The documents, products of a Public Records Act lawsuit filed by the organization in November, indicate that...

Texas Monthly to Call for Moratorium in Texas

Posted on December 10, 2010
That news from Jason Embry in his First Reading blog at the Austin American-Statesman. this morning. Texas Monthly calls for a moratorium on the death penalty in its January issue, which will hit newsstands Thursday. From the piece by Michael...

Editorials From New Hampshire

Posted on December 09, 2010
"Abolish the death penalty," is the editorial in today's Concord Monitor. Last week, after a year of testimony, public hearings and careful study, the state's 22-member Commission to Study the Death Penalty issued its report. By a 12-10 vote, the...

Nicholas Kristof on the Kevin Cooper Case in California

Posted on December 09, 2010
The New York Times Op Ed columnist's latest is, "Framed for Murder?" That?s the view of five federal judges in a case involving Kevin Cooper, a black man in California who faces lethal injection next year for supposedly murdering a...

Indigent Defense in San Antonio

Posted on December 09, 2010
Today's San Antonio Express-News reports, "Bexar task force to examine indigent defense." It's written by Brian Chasnoff. Responding to a proposal by Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff, commissioners agreed Wednesday to form an independent task force to explore best practices...

Oklahoma Lethal Injection Appeal Filed

Posted on December 09, 2010
Today's Oklahoman reports, "Defense attorney appeals federal court decision on Oklahoma execution." It's written by Robert Boczkiewicz. Oklahoma?s intention to use a drug the state has never used in executions would violate state law, a death row inmate?s attorney argued...

California's Scramble for Lethal Injection Drug

Posted on December 09, 2010
The ACLU of Northern California has released documents obtained from the state's Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation through a Freedom of Information Act request. The webpage is titled, "CDCR's December 8, 2010 Response to ACLU Public Records Act Request: ACLU...

Lawyers Try to Revive Texas Death-Penalty Hearing

Posted on December 09, 2010
That's the title of Ana Campoy's Wall Street Journal update on the Harris County hearing. The defense attorneys for an accused killer are trying to restart a controversial hearing on the legality of the death penalty in Texas after the...

California Officials Release Some Drug Information

Posted on December 08, 2010
Carol Williams posts, "California now has enough drugs to execute 175 death row inmates," at the Los Angeles Times. A correction revises the estimate in the headline, however. Corrections officials told a federal judge Tuesday that they have imported enough...

Claude Jones' Ashes

Posted on December 08, 2010
"A brother's last wish: 10 years after his execution, Claude Jones' ashes are laid to rest amid new questions about his guilt," is the title of Cindy Horswell's report in today's Houston Chronicle. For 10 years, Travis Jones faithfully carried...

Andrea Lyon on the Harris County Hearing

Posted on December 08, 2010
Shortly before the hearing was halted, Andrea Lyon posted, "Silence as Assent," at Huffington Post. Something extraordinary is happening in Texas. A trial judge is holding hearings and listening to evidence about whether that state's death penalty is unconstitutional because...

Continuing Coverage of the Harris County Hearing

Posted on December 08, 2010
"Hearing on Texas death penalty stopped by court," is the AP report, via Google News. An unusual court hearing on the constitutionality of the death penalty in Texas was put on hold Tuesday after the state's highest criminal court granted...

CCA Stays Harris County Hearing

Posted on December 07, 2010
"Hearing on Texas death penalty stopped by court," is Juan Lozano's latest AP report via the Austin American-Statesman. Texas' highest criminal court has stopped an unusual court hearing on the constitutionality of the death penalty in Texas. The Texas Court...

ABC News on the Cost Factor

Posted on December 07, 2010
Maya Srikrishnan posts, "Could Abolishing the Death Penalty Help States Save Money?," at ABC News. There is video at the link. California has a $25 billion deficit and almost 700 inmates on death row. According to a 2008 report issued...

No Such Thing as 'Humane' Executions

Posted on December 07, 2010
That's the title of today's Des Moines Register editorial. Numerous reasons exist for opposing the death penalty. It's wrong for the government to reduce itself to the level of criminals. Executions don't deter crime. Life in prison is a more...

Tennessee's Lethal Injection Challenge

Posted on December 07, 2010
"Tennessee lacks medical expertise for lethal injections," is the title of Erin Quinn's report for the Tennessean. Ricky Bell is prepared to take the back of Stephen West's head, brush his eyelashes and call out his name once a drug...

Montana's Lethal Injection Challenge

Posted on December 07, 2010
Today's Missoulian reports, "Montana, death-row inmate's lawyers want stay of execution to continue." It's written by Mike Dennison. Lawyers for the state and death-row inmate Ronald A. Smith argued Monday that the Montana Supreme Court should maintain an order blocking...

California Lethal Injection Drug From UK

Posted on December 07, 2010
The AP report by Paul Elias, "Calif gets supply of drug used during executions," is via the Silicon Valley Mercury News. California's prison department said Monday it has turned to an overseas manufacturer to replenish its supplies of sodium thiopental,...

More on the Bruce Webster Case

Posted on December 07, 2010
Scott Goldstein reports, "High court denies appeal of mentally retarded man who helped rape, kill Arlington teen," for today's Dallas Morning News. To execute Bruce Carneil Webster for the 1994 kidnapping, rape and murder of an Arlington teen would be...

News Coverage of Harris County Hearing - Day 1

Posted on December 07, 2010
"Legal Challenge to the Death Penalty Begins in Texas," is the title of James C. McKinley's report in today's New York Times. The death penalty went on trial Monday in Texas, a state where more prisoners are executed every year...

The Continuing Saga of Steven Hayne

Posted on December 06, 2010
That's the title of Radley Balko's post at Reason. It's subtitled, "The latest developments in the story of America's most industrious medical examiner." Here's the beginning of the report: Last week the Mississippi Supreme Court granted a new trial to...

OpEd Roundup

Posted on December 06, 2010
In Illinois, today's Chicago Tribune carries the OpEd, "Moratorium means agonizing legal limbo." It's by Mike Lawrence, a former journalist and press secretary to Gov. Jim Edgar from 1991 to 1997. Illinois' 10-year moratorium on executions has kept us from...

The Case of Bruce Webster

Posted on December 06, 2010
The Dallas Morning News has posted, "High court denies appeal of mentally retarded man who helped rape, kill Arlington teen." The U.S. Supreme Court has turned away the appeal of an Arkansas man who helped kidnap, rape and bury an...

Taking Notice of Texas and Claude Jones

Posted on December 06, 2010
Today's Philadelphia Inquirer carries the editorial, "Kill the Death Penalty." The wrongful execution of a man in Texas is just the latest case that argues against the use of the death penalty. Claude Howard Jones was executed in December 2000...

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