Texas Senate Approves Easing Restrictions on DNA Testing

Hank Skinner

Prisoners in Texas may get easier access to post-conviction DNA testing to prove their innocence. The Senate today passed a bill 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," said State Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, author of the bill, 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, such as with 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.

Source: The Texas Tribune, April 6, 2011

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Supreme Court says Texas inmate Henry "Hank" Skinner has right to DNA testing

Henry "Hank" Skinner

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has ruled that an inmate on death row in Texas can pursue his legal claims to crime-scene evidence that he says may show he is innocent.

The court’s narrow, 6-3 ruling Monday means that Hank Skinner will be not executed in the near future while his legal case continues.

But the decision will not necessarily result in Skinner winning the right to perform genetic testing on evidence found at the scene of the triple murder for which he received the death penalty.

Forty-seven states, including Texas, give convicted criminals in at least some circumstances the right to conduct post-trial DNA testing. More than 260 people have been exonerated after conviction through DNA evidence, according to the Innocence Project, which investigates cases and represents inmates.

The Supreme Court halted Skinner’s execution March 24, issuing an order less than an hour before he was scheduled to die.

The case is Skinner v. Switzer, 09-9000.

Source:Houston Chronicle, March 7, 2011

Supreme Court says Texas inmate has right to DNA testing

The Supreme Court has given another legal reprieve to a Texas death row inmate who says DNA testing of crime scene evidence will prove his "actual innocence."

It was unclear how the ruling will apply to similar legal challenges.

The justices by a 6-3 vote on Monday said Henry "Hank" Skinner does have a basic civil right to press for analysis of biological evidence not tested at the time of his trial.

The very narrow ruling does not yet get Skinner off death row for the murders of his girlfriend and her two sons, but it gives him another legal avenue to pursue to press his claims he did not commit the crimes.

Skinner came within 45 minutes of lethal injection before the justices stepped in and agreed to hear his constitutional claims.

Source: CNN, March 7, 2011

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Only 2% of Texas Counties Imposed Death Sentences This Year, According to New Report from TCADP

Huntsville Unit, Huntsville, where
executions by lethal injection
are carried out in Texas.

Death sentences, executions drop in 2010 as concerns about reliability and fairness continue to plague Texas death penalty system.

Death sentences in Texas have dropped more than 70% since 2003, reaching a historic low in 2010 according to the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty's (TCADP) new report, Texas Death Penalty Developments in 2010: The Year in Review. TCADP, an Austin-based statewide, grassroots advocacy organization, releases this annual report each December in conjunction with the anniversary of the resumption of executions in Texas in 1982.

Juries condemned eight new individuals to death in Texas in 2010, which is the lowest number of new death sentences since the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Texas' revised death penalty statute in 1976. These new sentences occurred in 6 counties: Brazos; Dallas; Harris; Nueces; Rusk; and Travis.

Recent sentencing trends illustrate the arbitrary and biased imposition of the death penalty. An analysis of data from 2007 to 2010 reveals that only 21 counties – 8% of the 254 counties – meted out death sentences over the last 4 years.

Out of a total 43 death sentences imposed statewide between 2007 and 2010, Dallas County leads with 7, followed closely by Harris County, with 6 new sentences. Bexar and Travis Counties each accounted for 3 new death sentences since 2007. Nearly 3/4 of all death sentences in Texas over the last 4 years have been imposed on people of color – 40% African American, 30% Hispanic/Latino, and 2% other.

As part of the report, TCADP has produced 2 interactive maps highlighting new death sentences by county from 2007 to 2010 and from 1976 to 2010. Clicking on each county reveals the total number of sentences, the number executed, the number awaiting execution, and the number exonerated. See below for links to each map.

The number of executions also dropped in 2010. The State of Texas executed17 people, the lowest number since 2001. The state remains the nation's leading executioner, accounting for approximately 37% of U.S. executions in 2010. The number of executions in Texas this year represents a smaller percentage of the national total than it has in recent years, however.

"Texas – along with the rest of the nation – is moving away from the death penalty," said Kristin Houlé, Executive Director of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. "The system is broken beyond repair, and the continued decline in new death sentences shows that jurors and prosecutors in Texas are seeking other ways to address violent crime."

Concerns about wrongful convictions and emerging evidence of wrongful executions dominated headlines this year. On October 27, 2010 Anthony Graves walked out of the Burleson County Jail after spending 18 years in prison – including 12 years on death row – for a crime he did not commit. Prosecutors dropped all charges against Graves and declared him innocent after conducting their own investigation of the case. His conviction was based on the testimony of Robert Carter, who was convicted and executed for the same crime in 2000 and who recanted several times, including from the gurney. Anthony Graves is the 12th person in Texas to be wrongfully convicted and removed from death row and the 138th nationwide.

The ongoing inquiry into the case of Cameron Todd Willingham also underscored the fallibility of the system. Willingham was executed in 2004 for setting a fire to his Corsicana home in 1991 that killed his 3 young daughters. The Texas Forensic Science Commission admitted "flaws" in the science used to convict him. In January it will hold a special meeting with some of the fire experts who have examined the case since the time of conviction and concluded that there was no evidence to support the finding of arson.

In another case of "flawed" science, recent DNA testing of evidence that was used to convict and execute Claude Jones ten years ago this month revealed that the strand of hair belonged to the victim, not to Jones, as a forensic expert testified during his 1990 trial. While the DNA results do not exonerate Jones, they raise serious questions about the reliability of his conviction.

Other highlights of Texas Death Penalty Developments in 2010: The Year in Review include the following:

* In 3 capital murder trials, juries rejected the death penalty and opted for a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. Over the last 3 years, juries have rejected the death penalty in a dozen cases (2 each in Travis and Bexar Counties).

* 3 inmates scheduled for execution in 2010 received last-minute stays; the execution date of another inmate was withdrawn. On March 24, Henry “Hank” Skinner received a stay from the U.S. Supreme Court shortly after eating his "last meal." In October, the Court heard arguments to determine whether Skinner can seek access to post-conviction DNA testing through the federal Civil Rights Act. Texas officials have refused to release key pieces of evidence gathered at the crime scene in 1993 for testing.

* At least 6 inmates received reduced sentences in 2010 and were removed from the death row population, including several inmates whose death sentences were overturned because jurors did not hear mitigating evidence during their original trials. 3 other inmates died in custody, including Ronald Chambers, who spent 35 years on death row and was awaiting a 4th sentencing hearing related to the 1975 murder of Mike McMahan.

* A nationwide shortage of the 1st drug used in the lethal injection protocol, sodium thiopental, led some states to postpone executions as their supplies dwindle or expire. In November, officials with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice revealed that they had enough drugs on hand to execute 39 people, but that doses of sodium thiopental will expire in March 2011.

* There currently are 317 people (307 men and 10 women) on death row in Texas. Texas holds the 3rd-largest death row population in the nation, after California (713) and Florida (393).

"2010 may go down in history as the 'Year of Doubt,' when case after case exposed the flaws and failures of the Texas death penalty and shook public faith in the criminal justice system to its core," said Houlé. "During this time of fiscal crisis, TCADP urges all elected officials to take a good hard look at the death penalty system and ask whether this is a good use of tax payers' dollars when there are alternative ways to protect society and punish those who are truly guilty."

Texas Death Penalty Developments in 2010: The Year in Review is available online at www.tcadp.org/TexasDeathPenaltyDevelopments2010.pdf . Contact Kristin Houlé at khoule@tcadp.org to receive a copy directly via email.

See http://tcadp.org/2007-2010-new-death-sentences/ for a map of new death sentences by county from 2007 to 2010.

See http://tcadp.org/death-sentences-by-county1976-2010/ for a map of death sentences by county from 1976 to 2010.

Download a pdf version of this press release. Obtener una copia de este anuncio.

Source: Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, December 13, 2010

Death penalty use drops in Texas to record low

Only 8 people were condemned to die in Texas this year, the lowest number since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, according to a new report from the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.

Despite Texas' bloodthirsty international image, only two percent of Texas counties used the death sentence this year: Brazos, Dallas, Harris, Nueces, Rusk and Travis. Dallas sent two of the eight to death row this year.

Source: Dallas Morning News, December 13, 2010