Following a call from the Houston Police Chief and from state leg­is­la­tors to halt exe­cu­tions in cas­es from Harris County, four of the state’s largest news­pa­pers pub­lished edi­to­ri­als in sup­port of a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions. The Houston police crime lab has been plagued with errors in DNA test­ing and preser­va­tion of evi­dence. There have been far more exe­cu­tions from Harris County (Houston) than from any oth­er coun­ty in the coun­try.


AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN

(N)othing can jus­ti­fy an exe­cu­tion if there is any good rea­son to ques­tion the evi­dence upon which the death sen­tence relies.

That’s why we urge Gov. Rick Perry to hon­or the requests from Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt, Sen. Rodney Ellis, D‑Houston, and state Sen. John Whitmire, chair­man of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, to sus­pend all sched­uled exe­cu­tions of inmates from Harris County until the jus­tice sys­tem can review the cas­es against them.

Such a review is nec­es­sary because of the wretched work of the Houston Police Department’s crime lab.
…
There’s no harm in wait­ing, and there could be enor­mous wrong in not wait­ing. No one should be exe­cut­ed for a crime he or she did not com­mit.

Not even in Texas. (Austin American-Statesman, October 7, 2004)


DALLAS MORNING NEWS

We respect Republican Gov. Rick Perry’s sup­port of the death penal­ty. But we don’t under­stand his shrug­ging off Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt’s request for a mora­to­ri­um on exe­cu­tions until the prob­lems with Houston’s noto­ri­ous crime lab get cleaned up.

No less a death penal­ty sup­port­er than state Sen. John Whitmire under­stands the sig­nif­i­cance of Chief Hurtt’s request. If the state exe­cutes a per­son who, it lat­er turns out, was con­vict­ed based upon faulty evi­dence from the trou­bled crime lab, the state will be respon­si­ble for an injus­tice of unimag­in­able mag­ni­tude. And death penal­ty oppo­nents would have more rea­son to decry Texas exe­cu­tions.
…
If Texas is going to keep exe­cut­ing pris­on­ers, it needs to make sure the cas­es are sol­id. As a death penal­ty sup­port­er, you’d think Gov. Perry would see it that way. (Dallas Morning News, October 7, 2004)

HOUSTON CHRONICLE

It is a trav­es­ty of jus­tice for Texas to con­tin­ue admin­is­ter­ing lethal injec­tions to death row inmates from Harris County even as foren­sic tests on hun­dreds of pieces of ques­tion­able evi­dence remain to be car­ried out. Even more dis­turb­ing, Houston police have only just begun a review of the con­tents of 280 mis­la­beled and pre­vi­ous­ly unac­count­ed for box­es of evi­dence they dis­cov­ered in August.
…
On the same day that Miniel was exe­cut­ed, the state released Ernest Ray Willis, a death row inmate for more than 17 years. Willis was con­vict­ed of set­ting a fatal fire. Modern analy­sis failed to find that arson had been com­mit­ted.

Fortunately for Willis, cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in Texas is not so swift. If gross injus­tice can be detect­ed 17 years after the fact, a pause of a few months to recheck box­es of new­ly dis­cov­ered evi­dence is sure­ly jus­ti­fied. (Houston Chronicle, October 8, 2004)


SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

Members of the Harris County judi­cia­ry should stop set­ting exe­cu­tion dates for Texas death row inmates until next spring.
…
Gov. Rick Perry refused a request by Sen. John Whitmire, D‑Houston, this week to halt the exe­cu­tions of Harris County inmates until March because of the qual­i­ty of work at the crime lab.

Those valid con­cerns war­rant a sus­pen­sion of the exe­cu­tions.
…
Because the exec­u­tive and leg­isla­tive branch­es of state gov­ern­ment refuse to address the issue, the judi­cia­ry is the last resort. (San Antonio Express-News, October 9, 2004)

See Innocence and Editorials.

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