Serious Concerns Raised After Discovery of Death Penalty Appeals Overlooked for Decades By Texas Courts

The Harris County District Clerk’s Office is attempt­ing to resolve near­ly one-hun­dred crim­i­nal appeals, includ­ing two death penal­ty cas­es, that were over­looked by the court sys­tem for decades. Among them are the appeals of the two death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers, Tony Tyrone Dixon and Syed Rabbani.

Tony Tyrone Dixon, a pris­on­er with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ties, was con­vict­ed of cap­i­tal mur­der he com­mit­ted at the age of 17 and sen­tenced to death in 1995. In August 1998, Mr. Dixon’s appel­late attor­ney filed his first post-con­vic­tion habeas cor­pus appeal, argu­ing that Mr. Dixon was men­tal­ly incom­pe­tent to stand tri­al. After the appeal was filed, the judge signed an order allot­ting pros­e­cu­tors an unspec­i­fied amount of time to file their response beyond the then 30-day dead­line. The pros­e­cu­tors did not respond to Mr. Dixon’s request for a new tri­al until 2014. For years, the tri­al court nev­er adju­di­cat­ed on Mr. Dixon’s or the prosecution’s claims. During the 16-year gap between the fil­ings, the U.S. Supreme Court held it was uncon­sti­tu­tion­al to peo­ple who com­mit­ted their crimes as juve­niles to death, result­ing in a new sen­tence of life impris­on­ment. After the for­got­ten appeals were dis­cov­ered last year, the dis­trict clerk sent Mr. Dixon’s appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeals in August 2022. In response to Mr. Dixon’s case, Benjamin Wolff, Director of the Office of Capital and Forensic Writs, stat­ed, ​“This now-46-year-old intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled per­son was large­ly for­got­ten by the crim­i­nal legal system.”

Syed Rabbani, a pris­on­er with men­tal ill­ness, was sen­tenced to death in 1988. In his appeal, Mr. Rabbani’s attor­neys argued that the jury had not been able to con­sid­er poten­tial­ly mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence, such as his men­tal ill­ness, when decid­ing whether to sen­tence him to life in prison or death. For 30 years, his appeal went unre­solved until the dis­trict court sent his appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeals in August 2022. The Court of Criminal Appeals remand­ed Mr. Rabbani’s case to the dis­trict court to review the argu­ments. In May 2023, the pros­e­cu­tors agreed with Mr. Rabbani’s claim and rec­om­mend­ed a new sentencing trial.

Although the cause of the miss­ing cas­es remains unknown, the court admin­is­tra­tion and the dis­trict clerk’s office cre­at­ed a process to noti­fy court admin­is­tra­tors every time a post-con­vic­tion appeal is filed. Jennifer Laurin, a University of Texas crim­i­nal law pro­fes­sor, com­ment­ed on the over­looked appeals by stat­ing, ​“Plenty of peo­ple like [Dixon] will have…factually inten­sive claims, claims that per­haps require tes­ti­mo­ny from wit­ness­es, claims that might require access­ing phys­i­cal evi­dence that may have dete­ri­o­rat­ed, that the pas­sage of time will make impos­si­ble to adjudicate.”