Via Grits for Breakfast, at the hand of Rick Casey at the Houston Chron :
During the closed-door session in which the 13-member commission debated what sanction it should give Sharon Keller, presiding judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, one non-lawyer member of the commission opined that Keller should be commended for saving the state money by blocking the appeal.
I mean, seriously, isn’t it bad enough we have to try ’em before we fry ’em?
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When I saw “Texas Edition” I was immediately scared of what I would read. This confirms it. We, as a nation (with Texas in the forefront), have gotten to the point where, by and large, so long as it does not affect us, we don’t care if an innocent person is executed. Some of us have even gotten to the point, we will waive constitutional rights so that the police can keep us all “safe”. What happens when that system turns against you, and no one will listen to your cries of innocence?
Don’t be ridiculous, Jackie. It only happens to bad people. Good people have nothing to fear.
The sentiment is even more grotesque because the guy likely had a viable Atkins claim. George Denkowski, the shrink who assessed him, was later found to be inflating IQ scores of death-row inmates he assessed for prosecutors. I’d give links but per your policy, but the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities’ diagnostic manual has a section which singles him out by name to “strongly caution against practices such as those recommended by Denkowski.”
By the time of the Richard case, Denkowski’s shenanigans had been well-established and disapproved by both Texas courts and his professional peers. (See Texas Observer, “Cracked,” Jan. 8, 2010)
All the attention is given to the Baze aspect of the case because that’s what caused the delay, the “We close at 5” episode, etc.. But the bigger injustice is that a guy who may well have had a viable Atkins claim was executed anyway despite the known use of junk science in his case.
Yeah, Jackie, everybody knows that only guilty people try to hide behind their constitutional rights!