Entries tagged with “Stephen Barbee”
Research
Botched Executions
,Dec 07, 2022
As Lethal Injection Turns Forty, States Botch a Record Number of Executions
On December 7, 1982, Texas strapped Charles Brooks to a gurney, inserted an intravenous line into his arm, and injected a lethal dose of sodium thiopental into his veins, launching the lethal-injection era of American executions. In the precisely forty years since, U.S. states and the federal government have put 1377 prisoners to death by some version of the method. Touted as swift and painless and a more humane way to die — just as execution proponents had said nearly a century before about…
Executions
Upcoming Executions
,Nov 14, 2022
Week of Four Scheduled Executions Highlights Continued Concerns With the Use of the Death Penalty
The four executions scheduled for the week of November 17th highlight current trends in executions and death sentencing and the continued use of the death penalty against vulnerable populations. The prisoners scheduled to be executed by four states have raised a number of issues, including prosecutorial misconduct, ineffective assistance of counsel, discrimination against Black jurors, judicial override of jury decisionmaking, serious mental illness, and brain damage. Stephen Barbee (Texas…
Issues
Religion
,Upcoming Executions
,Oct 12, 2021
Texas Federal Court Stays Execution of Stephen Barbee on Religious Freedom Issue, Defense Seeks Review of False Forensic Testimony
A federal court in Texas has stayed the October 12, 2021 execution of Texas death-row prisoner Stephen Barbee on his claims that the state’s refusal to allow his spiritual advisor to administer last rites, touch him, or pray out loud in the execution chamber violates his constitutional and federal statutory rights to free exercise of religion. Judge Kenneth M. Hoyt of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas issued the stay on October 7, 2021, citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s…
Issues
Sep 25, 2019
Execution Looms for One Texas Prisoner as Another Receives Stay from Texas Appeals Court
Texas is preparing to execute Robert Sparks (pictured, left), on September 25, 2019, as a second death-row prisoner, Stephen Barbee (pictured, below), received a stay from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Sparks’ case is the latest in which Texas prosecutors sought and obtained an execution warrant while appeals in the case were pending before state or federal courts. On May 6, 2019, Sparks court-appointed federal habeas counsel filed a petition for writ of certiorari asking the U.S.