Entries tagged with “Patrick Murphy (TX)”
Facts & Research
Clemency
,Religion
,Mar 27, 2019
Board Denies Clemency for Texas Man Convicted Under Law of Parties Who Was Not Present When Killing Occurred
The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied clemency for Patrick Murphy (pictured) on March 27, 2019, moving the state one step closer to executing him on March 28 for a murder he neither committed nor intended to commit nor was present when it…
Facts & Research
Religion
,United States Supreme Court
,Apr 05, 2019
Commentators Question Why Supreme Court Stopped One Execution, But Not Another With Identical Religious Exercise Issues
Legal scholars and commentators across the political spectrum have criticized the U.S. Supreme Court for its seemingly contradictory actions, less than two months apart, in two nearly identical religious freedom claims from death-row prisoners. On February 7, 2019, the Court vacated a stay of execution and permitted Alabama to execute death-row prisoner Domineque Ray (pictured, left), who had claimed that the Alabama Department of Corrections…
Facts & Research
Religion
,United States Supreme Court
,Upcoming Executions
,Sep 07, 2021
Condemned Prisoner Asks U.S. Supreme Court to Stay His Execution Unless Texas Corrections Officials Permit His Religious Advisor to ‘Lay on Hands’ While He is Being Put to Death
Texas death-row prisoner John Ramirez (pictured) is asking the United States Supreme Court to stay his September 8, 2021 execution, arguing that the state’s refusal to allow his pastor to pray out loud with him and lay hands on him while he is being executed violates federal law and his First Amendment right to free exercise of…
Facts & Research
United States Supreme Court
,Executions Overview
,May 15, 2019
Death-Penalty Opinions Expose Deep Divisions on U.S. Supreme Court
In the wake of sharp criticism of several controversial death-penalty decisions, the five conservative justices of the U.S. Supreme Court issued three opinions on May 13, 2019, explaining their votes in those earlier cases. The opinions, issued in connection with the apparently inconsistent orders in religious discrimination claims brought by two death-row prisoners and a decision declining to review the case of an Alabama death-row prisoner who had challenged the state’s…
Facts & Research
Religion
,Nov 11, 2019
Texas Prisoner Receives Second Stay of Execution Over Religious Discrimination Issue
A federal district court has granted a stay of execution to a Buddhist death-row prisoner in Texas over allegations that the state is discriminatorily denying him access to religious services that would be available to Christian prisoners on the day of their execution. On November 7, 2019, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas stayed the November 13 execution of Patrick Murphy (pictured), marking the second time in 2019 that his…
Facts & Research
Religion
,Apr 26, 2021
Texas Revises Execution Protocol to Permit Spiritual Advisers in Death Chamber
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) has amended its execution protocol to permit a condemned prisoner to be accompanied in the execution chamber by a spiritual adviser of his or her own…
Facts & Research
Religion
,United States Supreme Court
,Executions Overview
,Sep 09, 2021
U.S. Supreme Court Stays Texas Execution, Agrees to Review Contours of the Right to Religious Exercise in the Execution Chamber
In an after-hours order issued on September 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court halted Texas’s planned execution of John Henry Ramirez and agreed to review his claim that the state’s refusal to allow his pastor to “lay hands” on him or pray audibly during the execution violated federal law and his First Amendment right to the free exercise of…