As the saga of door shutting Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Presiding Judge Sharon Keller moves forward, at least we get a good laugh out of it.  Judge Keller has submitted her response to the charges levied against her by the Texas Commission for Judicial Conduct, and the Texas Tornado, Mark Bennett, has had a field day enjoying the image of Sharon Keller twisting in the wind.

Bennett’s favorite part of the response is the part where Keller whines about the state’s refusal to pay her law firm’s customary fees to defend her:

The net effect is that these two arms of Texas government are forcing Respondent to an election; either defend herself pro se or risk a financially ruinous legal bill to defend against these charges which are without merit.

The irony is overwhelming.  So Judge Keller is horribly upset at the prospect of facing financial ruin to defend against meritless charges?  How nice to see the shoe on the other foot.  I wonder whether she has the slightest clue that she’s getting a taste of the medicine she’s rammed down the throats of Texas defendants regularly.

But what’s particularly disturbing about Killer Keller’s defense is that it’s an indictment in reverse.  Her “defense” to the charges that she slammed shut the door of the courthouse as a defendant faced the executioner bears a striking resemblance to the type of visceral, prejudiced, irrational attacks on criminal defendants in general that have long been used to overcome the absence of fact and logic and rely on stereotyped hatred.

Keller argues that, at length, that Michael Wayne Richard, the man whose fate she sealed, was a bad, evil man.  Obviously, her point is that he deserved to die anyway, so no harm, no foul.  Does she suggest that he’s unworthy of her judicial concern or time? Yes, that’s what she suggests.  She plays the old “he’s guilty anyway” card, and needed killing.  Great concept from a judge, right?

Next she recites all the “due process” he was given, to show that he had his day in court and one more shot (notwithstanding the Supreme Court’s decision that very morning to grant cert. in Baze v. Rees).  Even though the defense was clearly entitled to raise this argument anew, the point of Keller’s argument is that it wasn’t like he didn’t deserve to die.  Indeed, she also argues that any stay based on Baze would have been an objection to the method, not the fact of execution.

And finally, she blames everyone else involved, from defense lawyers who could have submitted their papers earlier in the day, or could have broken a window to find a way into the courthouse even if the doors were locked, to her own general counsel Ed Marty, who could have explained everything to her using smaller words so that she would understand him better as she waited at home for the (refrigerator?) repairman.

Not that the mere fact that Judge Sharon Keller is so callous about the fact that her hand shut the courthouse door on a man about to be executed, a fact that obviously doesn’t disturb her in the slightest, but her overt hostility toward the defendant and her utter lack of care for either the law or a human life mark her as one stone cold woman.  If she loses her job as judge, maybe she can find a new one pushing down the plunger.

So what does all this mean?  In Texas, my guess is that, if she can beat the rap, it assures her re-election victory by a landslide.  After all, Michael Wayne Richard needed killing.  But at least for now, we can enjoy watching Killer Keller with the shoe on the other foot.  I sure hope they don’t pinch.  Too much.

Update:  Bennett’s got more on the subject, this time from the Houston Chronicle’s Rick Casey.

The judge should know better, especially in these tough times, than to ask us taxpayers to agree to a lawyer whose usual and customary fees can lead to a ruinous legal bill. However, I personally would be willing to chip in for the kind of lawyers whom Keller has found acceptable for people whose lives were at stake.

Looks like everybody’s jumping on the irony train.  Don’t let it leave without you.