Dallas Blog

Bill Janklow says driving drunk ain't a Texas thang.

Let's not lose site of the ball here people. Michael Richard was not mentally retarded. His actions before, during and after the crime were clearly the work of a man capable of cognitive thinking.

Democratic State Rep. Lon Burnam has an agenda, but the agenda has absolutely nothing to do with protecting the mentally retarded. Burnam's actions are disingenuous at best. If the attorney's for Michael Richard had compelling evidence suggesting retardation, they would have presented their evidence long before the execution date. Lon Burnam knows this.

The state of Texas got it right. They executed a violent murderer with a below average IQ, nothing more, nothing less. Sharon Keller could have kept the lights on all night, but Michael Richard would still be dead.

Public officials must be held to a high(er) standard? Higher than what? We're talking about the rule of law, right? And if the deadline is at 5pm, then what's higher than that? Closing at 5-till would be low, yes, and if the banker locked the doors at 5-till (which happens), there would be nothing that I could do about it. So yes, let's hold public officials to a higher standard of doing their jobs right.

If I don't pay my car insurance by midnight on the 15th of every month, even if the check is there in the office at 8am when they open on the 16th, my insurance still gets canceled.

Why does it seem like lawyers always wait till the last minute to file stays?

Excellent comments Lakewooder. Right on point

scott, I believe the death penalty serves a very important purpose. It provides a measure of closure for the victim's family, friends and loved ones. You will find these people at virtually every execution. There's a reason why they're there, and in most cases I don't believe it has anything to do with vengeance.

I am comparing the cost to Life without Parole. There would be a similar "closure" if "Life without Parole." And, for every man we don't execute, we could incarcerate 4 more for life without parole.

If we weren't executing such an exorbitant number of people we could probably afford our prisons. How again are your big gallows show a sensible idea?

Ahh, yes. Th ol' "it costs less for life w/o parole than to execute" line. What that conveniently ignores is the cost of death row is made up mainly of appeals that go on and on. Do you really think that if the death penalty is done away with that lawyers then won't switch those endless appeals to the lifers? Of course they will, and then the cost of lifers will be the same as death row was with the added cost of caring for an increasingly aging prison population.

scott, you're missing the point, I think. Look, I'm not suggesting anything I say will change your mind, but you need to understand something. Life without parole means the victims family goes to bed every night and wakes up every morning knowing the person that killed their loved one is alive and living in the general population of a prison; eating, drinking, watching TV, listening to music, exercising, working out in the gym, playing basketball, visiting/hanging out with his prison-mates, having sex with his prison bitches, etc. There's no closure. Capitol punishment provides closure for the victims family. That's very important, and that's all I'm trying to say.

What makes the closing at 5pm thing bad in this instance was that the U.S. Supreme Court had a case before it that would decide whether or not lethal injection was constitutional. The fact that this Supreme Court decision was still pending led the rest of the states halting their executions until the question could be resolved.

She also failed to inform any of the other judges on the panel about her unilateral decision to close the court to last-minute appeals (at least two judges were waiting at the office for the appeals to come). At the very least, it seems like the decision to close the court would be something that more than just one judge on the court should be able to decide. She didn't even bother to tell the judge on the court who was assigned to process any last-minute appeals in that particular case.

When at least three other judges on the panel were open to hearing the appeal, why should one judge get to unilaterally decide that "the court closes at 5pm"? Who made her queen of the court?

Executing this guy may well have been the right thing to do (certainly the Supreme Court eventually decided that lethal injection was constitutional), but when at least three judges are willing to hear the appeal, one judge shouldn't have the ability to unilaterally shut down the court.

And that doesn't even get into the issues regarding her utter disregard for actual innocence claims.

The reason the filing was "late" was because that very day the Supreme Court decided to take up the question of the constitutionality of lethal injections. According to the AFP, Richard was the last person executed before a seven month moratorium. Whether or not Richard was guilty as sin is beside the point here. This judge acted unprofessionally and inappropriately in a life and death (and constitutional) matter.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hJ_NB4DfQwhPm2iSQcXtLuOczunQ

I first read about the proposed impeachment yesterday on Capitol Annex,

http://capitolannex.com/2009/02/16/articles-of-impeachment-against-court-of-criminal-appeals-presiding-judge-sharron-keller-filed-by-state-rep-lon-burnam/

The real problem is that we elect high court judges to begin with. This has been the root of many legal problems in Texas and across the South, where many other states elect their high court judges.

That being said, Killer Keller should be impeached, stripped of her law license, and charged with criminal negligence, and thrown in the state prison for life where she belongs.

Sharon Keller is a godless woman who is a cancer on the State of Texas.

@Lakewooder,

No, I do not have any relatives, nor do I know anyone at all, who has ever been convicted of a felon, much less put in prison.

Electing judges is a bad idea. Partisan politics should have no place in an impartial judicial system.

After like 20 people have been freed from prison, in Dallas county alone, because they were really innocent, shouldn't we pause and reevaluate the way we do business?

I think the answer is obvious.

@Lakewooder

If you had spent the last 25 years of your life in a Texas state prison for the rape of a woman that you had nothing to do with, you would probably be a little less flippant in your attitude.

No system is perfect. But having the Governor of a state appoint high court judges, and then having a bi-partisan legislature confirm them, is probably a better way to do it.

Better than to have the judges run in an election where they have to pick a party, raise money, appease supporters, and run for re-election every four years.

Appointing judges has worked fairly well at the federal level. What reason is there to continue to elect Texas judges?

In 15 years when Texas has turned Blue again, then maybe you and I will both be singing a different tune.

The death penalty is a huge embarrassment to out state and nation. It is a ridiculous act of ignorance that is perpetrated for no purpose other than blood lust. We should all be ashamed.

"Actually, you are completely wrong. The fact that once justices are confirmed, they then serve for life, actually gives them the judicial freedom to not be beholden to anyone at all."

That there are only a few examples of Justices performing differently than expected when they shouldn't have any reason to stay within their ideology was my point. There were actually more local judges switching parties to get elected here in Dallas last year than there have been Supreme Court Justices switching ideologies in its history.

"But the justices who sit on our state's highest courts should not be subject to the whims of voters every few years."

I don't have anything against appointing judges, at least at the higher levels, i'm just pointing out that it doesn't remove the politics from their decisions.I doubt you'd find more than a handful of Justices who have switched ideologies. And for every one of them, you'd find dozens, if not more, elected judges who switched parties just as happened in Dallas last year, which would suggest that elected judges are a lot less beholden to ideology than appointed judges.

MattP-

Love you really, I do. But, if the real point is, as you say, that there's a pattern with this judge (presumably a dangerous one), that attracted even national attention, then why all the attention AFTER the story about closing the office at 5pm? It wasn't national news when she was saying basic dumb stuff (as many other people- including judges- do) during the routine course of her daily job. Maybe local courthouse juice, but the national attention only happened after this apparently sensationalist act. So, no, if there's a pattern that's newsworthy, then write about that, in fact, make national news about her idiotic ramblings about DNA of lack thereof and the like. It's excuses like this that make otherwise intelligent people start to thing that maybe, just maybe, there's something to this whole "liberal media"...

Suburban Idiot-

Who made her "queen of the court" for unilaterally deciding to close the court on time? Well, she's a judge and didn't commit a crime in carrying out her duties, so the answer sort of speaks for itself.

No ones going to impeach her. No reason to. Another biased story.

Michael Richard deserved what was coming to him. But, Sharon Keller is a politician elected by the people of Texas and should be treated like one. We should not be giving her the same deference that we give to appointed judges or those selected by a merit panel. First and foremost Keller is a politician. Period.