NEW VOICES: Texas Paper Calls for Halt to Executions

The San Antonio Express-News, which sup­ports the death penal­ty, recent­ly called for a halt to exe­cu­tions in Texas because of con­cerns about the ongo­ing prob­lems at the Houston Crime Lab. The Express-News stat­ed:

This month, New Jersey law­mak­ers vot­ed to halt exe­cu­tions while a task force reviews the fair­ness and costs of impos­ing the death penal­ty.

Texas should con­sid­er doing the same but for slight­ly dif­fer­ent rea­sons.

The dis­turb­ing facts com­ing out of an inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tion into cas­es han­dled by the Houston Police Department lab beg for a tem­po­rary sus­pen­sion of exe­cu­tions, at least until all cas­es the lab han­dled are reviewed.

In a report issued this month, an inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tor stat­ed the Houston Police Department crime lab failed to report evi­dence that might have helped crim­i­nal defen­dants and found errors in almost one-third of the cas­es reviewed, the Houston Chronicle report­ed.

Among the cas­es in which the inves­ti­ga­tor found prob­lems are three involv­ing death row inmates. That is deeply dis­turb­ing.

Texas is one of 38 states with a death penal­ty. At least 13 states have appoint­ed study com­mis­sions. Texas should do the same.
…
Texas needs to halt fur­ther use of the exe­cu­tion cham­ber until all the evi­dence used to con­demn defen­dants, espe­cial­ly those from Harris County, is sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly val­i­dat­ed.

There are 410 pris­on­ers on Texas’ death row, 143 of them from Harris County. Some of those cas­es go back to 1976 and were not part of the ini­tial review by the inde­pen­dent inves­ti­ga­tor, which looked only at cas­es between 1987 and 2002.

The inves­ti­ga­tor has now extend­ed his review to include cas­es going back to 1980.

The state has good rea­son to delay the 11 exe­cu­tions sched­uled through April, includ­ing one set for today.

The integri­ty of the Texas crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem, which is respon­si­ble for one-third of the exe­cu­tions in this coun­try, is at stake.

We are not against the death penal­ty, but the state must be cer­tain that inno­cent peo­ple are not exe­cut­ed.

(San Antonio Express-News, January 19, 2006). See Innocence and Editorials.