Texas Defender News Today

Duane Buck, a death row inmate from Texas, has been denied a new trial despite evidence of racial bias.

Harris County, Texas, is the death penalty capital of the country. In most cases resulting in a death sentence in the past 20 years, appointed defense lawyers failed to uncover potentially life-saving evidence, the report found.

Harris County, Texas, is the death penalty capital of the country. In most cases resulting in a death sentence in the past 20 years, appointed defense lawyers failed to uncover potentially life-saving evidence, the report found.

Scott Panetti was deemed incompetent for execution. What does this mean for other mentally ill death row prisoners?

A Texas jury sentenced Melissa Lucio to death on July 22, 2008. Just this week, lawyers filed a petition for Commutation of Death Sentence to a Lesser Penalty or, in the Alternative, a 120-Reprieve from Execution, arguing that Lucio is factually innocent of taking her daughter, Mariah’s, life.

Hamilton Reappointed as Texas Public Insurance Counsel March 12, 2021 Melissa Hamilton has been reappointed as public counsel for the Texas Office of Public Insurance Counsel (OPIC), which represents insurance consumers in regulatory matters relating to insurance rates, rules and forms. Hamilton has served as the public counsel since January 2018. Previously, she served as director of Governmental Relations for the Texas Department of Insurance. Prior to TDI,...

He’s Too Mentally Ill To Execute. Why Is He Still On Death Row After 45 Years? Patch 2/18/2021 2021-02-04 Raymond Riles arrived on Texas’s death row in 1976, the year President Gerald Ford lost his reelection bid and the first “Rocky” movie debuted in theaters. Riles had been sentenced to death in Houston for killing a used car salesman named John Henry. Forty-five years and eight presidents later, Riles remains there, having survived three cancelled execution dates to become the long...

He’s Too Mentally Ill to Execute. Why Is He Still on Death Row After 45 Years? Raymond Riles has been on death row longer than anyone in America. He’s one of many who have languished there for decades with severe mental illnesses. Raymond Riles, right, with Ronald OBryan at the Ellis Unit in Huntsville, Texas, in 1979. In that era, incarcerated people on death row could go to the exercise yard for three 90-minute periods a week. Bruce Jackson The death penalty ...