According to a review by the Houston Chronicle, Texas attor­neys who failed to meet dead­lines in fil­ing their clients’ appeals for­feit­ed the final oppor­tu­ni­ty to appeal for at least 9 men, 6 of whom have already been exe­cut­ed. The fail­ures includ­ed lawyers who mis­cal­cu­lat­ed or mis­un­der­stood the dead­lines, com­put­er fail­ures, and human error. Many were dis­missed sim­ply because they were filed after busi­ness hours on the day of the dead­line. James Marcus, an expert in cap­i­tal case law who teach­es in the Capital Punishment Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law, said miss­ing the dead­line for a fed­er­al writ of habeas cor­pus — there­by waiv­ing all fed­er­al review — is the equiv­a­lent of ​“sleep­ing through the tri­al.” One attor­ney missed the dead­line to file the appeal for two dif­fer­ent clients and blamed a mal­func­tion­ing fil­ing machine for his tar­di­ness both times. One of those clients has been exe­cut­ed and the oth­er client was nev­er told that his attor­ney had missed the dead­line – he hadn’t heard from his attor­ney in over a year. ​“So what am I sup­posed to do now?” asked Texas death row inmate Keith Steven Thurmond upon hear­ing the news from a reporter. The Texas Attorney General’s Office acknowl­edged that they work aggres­sive­ly to get late fil­ings dis­missed on behalf of the state. 

(L. Olsen, ​“Tardy paper­work takes away final appeals for nine men, six of whom have been exe­cut­ed,” Houston Chronicle, March 22, 2009). See Representation.

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