After spend­ing 20 years on death row, inmates Roy Gene Smith and David Lewis had their death sen­tences thrown out by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on April 28. The state’s high­est crim­i­nal court ruled that jurors who con­vict­ed Smith were erro­neous­ly kept from hear­ing tes­ti­mo­ny about his upbring­ing in a crime-rid­den Houston neigh­bor­hood. The court also deter­mined that Lewis should have been able to present evi­dence of his dam­aged eye­sight and that he began using drugs and alco­hol with his abu­sive moth­er at the age of 13. The deci­sions were in keep­ing with rul­ings made by the U.S. Supreme Court since the defen­dants’ tri­als regard­ing Texas’s mis­han­dling of death penal­ty cas­es. Smith and Lewis may face re-tri­als in Harris County and Angelina County, respectively.

Texas leads the coun­try in exe­cu­tions with 454, includ­ing almost half of the exe­cu­tions car­ried out in 2009-10. 

(M. Graczyk, ​“Two con­demned Texas killers win new pun­ish­ment tri­al,” Associated Press, April 28, 2010). See also Arbitrariness. Read U.S. Supreme Court deci­sions regard­ing the death penalty.

Citation Guide