Texas Death Row Prisoner Commits Suicide

On January 21, 2023, Texas death row pris­on­er Terence Andrus hanged him­self at the age of 34, a lit­tle more than 6 months after the U.S. Supreme Court denied review of his case for a sec­ond time. His lawyer, Gretchen Sween, told the Los Angeles Times that ​“he’d been careen­ing toward the abyss,” since their deci­sion. ​“He was broken.”

In 2008, at the age of 20, Andrus killed two peo­ple dur­ing an attempt­ed car­jack­ing while high on PCP-laced mar­i­jua­na. He was sen­tenced to death in 2012 by a jury that was unaware of his diag­no­sis of affec­tive psy­chosis – a mood dis­or­der caus­ing hal­lu­ci­na­tions for which he was diag­nosed in ele­men­tary school – parental neglect as a child, or the trau­ma he endured in juve­nile deten­tion. Beginning at the age of 16, he spent 18 months at an over­crowd­ed juve­nile deten­tion cen­ter, where he was giv­en high dos­es of psy­chotrop­ic drugs and placed in soli­tary con­fine­ment, con­sist­ing of a cold and filthy cell for extend­ed peri­ods, either for engag­ing in self-muti­la­tion, sui­ci­dal feel­ings, minor ado­les­cent infrac­tions, or at his own request to escape the vio­lence in the facility.

Andrus had twice appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court cit­ing inad­e­quate tri­al rep­re­sen­ta­tion. In June 2020, the Court ruled in favor of Andrus 6 – 3, find­ing that his coun­sel failed to prop­er­ly inves­ti­gate or present ​“abun­dant” mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence dur­ing the penal­ty phase of the case, which includ­ed his ​“ordeal” in juve­nile deten­tion, which left ​“an already trau­ma­tized Andrus all but sui­ci­dal.” The Court direct­ed the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to recon­sid­er ​“whether Andrus has shown that counsel’s defi­cient per­for­mance prejudiced him.” 

In May 2021, the TCCA reaf­firmed an ear­li­er deci­sion, stat­ing that “[t]he mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence is not par­tic­u­lar­ly com­pelling.” A sec­ond appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court was denied review in June 2022, with three dissents. 

Just days after Andrus’ sui­cide, Texas death row pris­on­ers filed a law­suit on January 26, 2023 against the state for their uncon­sti­tu­tion­al con­di­tions of con­fine­ment, includ­ing indef­i­nite soli­tary con­fine­ment, min­i­mal health care, and improp­er access to coun­sel. Most of the 181 pris­on­ers have spent years endur­ing days of 22 hours to 24 hours of soli­tary con­fine­ment, about 75 of whom have endured these con­di­tions for more than two decades. The law­suit claims that such con­di­tions are uncon­sti­tu­tion­al as it vio­lates the 8^th amendment’s right against cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. Prolonged and indef­i­nite soli­tary con­fine­ment is also a vio­la­tion of the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, more com­mon­ly known as the Nelson Mandela rules.