The defense attor­neys for death row inmate Charles Hood in Texas have filed a civ­il law­suit that would require retired Judge Verla Sue Holland and for­mer dis­trict attor­ney Tom O’Connell, Jr. to tes­ti­fy under oath whether they were hav­ing an inti­mate affair while both were par­tic­i­pat­ing in the cap­i­tal tri­al of Mr. Hood. The under­ly­ing claim is ​“that Judge Holland or Tom O’Connell deprived Charles Hood of his con­sti­tu­tion­al rights by not reveal­ing this roman­tic rela­tion­ship pri­or to his cap­i­tal mur­der tri­al,” defense attor­ney Greg Wiercioch said. The fil­ing asks the court to depose the pair and order the two to pro­duce any let­ters, cards, and gifts exchanged between them, as well as cred­it card or store receipts for any gifts, all pho­tographs and video­tapes depict­ing the two togeth­er, and all emails or text mes­sages per­tain­ing to alle­ga­tions about their alleged roman­tic rela­tion­ship. ​“It’s the only way we feel we’re going to be able to get to talk to Judge Holland and the for­mer dis­trict attor­ney Tim O’Connell,” said Wiercioch. ​“Nobody’s heard any­thing from them and it’s get­ting close to the exe­cu­tion date. We need to find some method of ask­ing them or court order­ing them to coop­er­ate.”

In June, Hood’s attor­neys filed appeals to state and fed­er­al courts with an affi­davit from a for­mer assis­tant dis­trict attor­ney who said the roman­tic rela­tion­ship was ​“com­mon knowl­edge.” Despite a dis­cov­ery motion seek­ing infor­ma­tion sev­er­al months ago and a state­ment from three dozen legal ethi­cists say­ing a roman­tic rela­tion­ship between the judge and pros­e­cu­tor would vio­late Mr. Hood’s con­sti­tu­tion­al rights, Wiercioch hasn’t ​“heard any­thing from the DA’s office on it.” The sched­uled June exe­cu­tion was halt­ed because the Texas Department of Criminal Justice said they ran out of time to car­ry it out before the death war­rant expired. Hood’s exe­cu­tion is now sched­uled for September 10.
(D. Jennings, ​“Texas death row inmate’s defense hopes to prove roman­tic link between Collin County ex-pros­e­cu­tor, retired judge,” The Dallas Morning News, August 20, 2008). See Arbitrariness.

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