« The Plight of the Exonerated | Main | California Non-Capital Exoneration »
Texas Roundup
The Houston Chronicle posts, "Being pro-life in governor's race doesn't extend to death-row inmates," by Peggy Fikac, the Austin Bureau Chief of the Chronicle's sister-paper, the San Antonio Express-News.
When Attorney General Greg Abbott talks about his opposition to abortion, he often mentions his Catholic faith.
Not so when he talks about his support for the death penalty, whose abolition is advocated by Pope Francis.
Abbott's Democratic opponent, Sen. Wendy Davis, also backs the death penalty - even though as a Fort Worth City Council member in 2000 she voted to impose a moratorium on it, and even though the Texas Democratic Party platform calls for substituting life in prison for capital punishment, saying the death penalty is applied disproportionately to the poor and persons of color.
"Questions of Competence," is by Chase Hoffberger for the Austin Chronicle.
Eighteen years of appeals are ended. In April, nearly two decades after being sentenced to death by the state of Texas, now-40-year-old Larry Hatten told his attorneys and a Corpus Christi court that he didn't want to waste any more time with what he considered inevitable.
After being declared mentally competent, Hatten was given a final execution date: Wednes­day, Oct. 15. He'll be the 10th inmate executed this year, and 518th since the reinstatement of Texas' death penalty in 1976.
Houston's KPFT-FM will host Execution Watch on the web and its HD radio broadcast signal beginning at 6:00 p.m. (CDT), Wednesday.
According to TDCJ, state district courts have scheduled one more execution for 2014, and eight executions have already been scheduled for 2015.
Earlier coverage from Texas begins at the link.
Monday, 13 October 2014 at 03:11 PM in Capital Punishment, Competency , Execution Date, Judiciary, Lethal Injection, Politics, TDCJ, TX | Permalink
Tags: capital punishment, competency, death penalty, execution date, Greg Abbott, Larry Hatten, politics, post-conviction review, Texas, Wendy Davis