AUSTIN -- Well, isn't that special? The governor has granted a 30-day stay
to a man on death row so we can figure out from DNA evidence whether the guy
should be on Death Row. He may well be, but it'll be nice to be certain for
a change.
It took Bush only 131 executions to find a case where he thought there
might be some doubt about the matter. No, I take that back. He did once
grant a pardon: He had to. That was the memorable case of Henry Lee Lucas,
the serial liar, who confessed to 150 murders before our brighter
law-enforcement minds started to wonder if he was telling the truth.
The impeccable Texas criminal justice system -- about which the governor is
so certain he has repeatedly said he has never had a shred a doubt about any
of the 131 executions on his watch -- managed to convict Lucas of a murder
that rather demonstrably occurred while Lucas was in another state entirely.
Ooops.
It is particularly entertaining to watch Bush on national television
solemnly explaining that those on Texas' Death Row have "full access to the
courts."
They do? Then why did the court of criminal appeals throw out Ricky
McGinn's request for new DNA testing two days before his scheduled
execution? Why does it take a 30-day stay from the governor to get DNA
evidence examined? Because, may I suggest, those on Death Row in Texas do
NOT have full access to the courts, or anything like it.
When the Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association started its own
Innocence Project -- modeled after Barry Scheck's effective New York legal
operation that has now proved the innocence of almost 100 men and women,
some on Death Row -- two people whose names you may recall from the past
were present, Randall Dale Adams and Clarence Brandly. Neither one of whom
would be alive today if the current rules limiting access to the courts had
been effect when their painfully questionable convictions were finally
overturned.
To my mind, the McGinn case is not nearly as questionable as another
execution that took place on Wednesday that may well have destroyed the last
chance of another man who may be innocent. Read this one and see what you
think.
A prison guard named Robert Carter ran amok in 1992 in Somerville,
stabbing, shooting and burning six family members, including his 4-year-old
son from a previous relationship. At one point, Carter claimed that Anthony
Graves, a cousin of his wife, did most of the killing that night. Carter
attempted to retract his charge against Graves early on, but wound up
testifying against him after receiving his own death sentence in 1994.
Carter insisted in a deposition given last month that he had tried to
exonerate Graves in the past and that the reason he lied was because
authorities pressured him to name an accomplice and threatened to prosecute
his wife, Theresa. There is a videotape of him making the same statement in
1997. Carter wrote Graves' lawyer at least nine times over the years telling
of Graves' innocence.
At his execution last week, six members of the victims' family were
present. Carter, strapped to the gurney, said: "I'm sorry for all the pain
I've caused your family. It was me and me alone. Anthony Graves had nothing
to do with it. I lied on him in court."
Graves has two witnesses that could testify to his location the night of
the incident: his brother, Arthur, and girlfriend, Yolanda Mathis.
Arthur testified at the trial. But Mathis, the only true alibi, said she
was afraid to testify because she felt she had been threatened with
prosecution. During the trial, she literally went running from the
courthouse just before she was to testify.
The forensic evidence against Graves is "ridiculous trash," according to
his appeals lawyer, Roy Greenwood. But since the testimony of an accomplice
is so powerful, said Greenwood, without Carter there to retract in person,
Graves' chances are less.
The court of appeals, which is rapidly becoming a misnomer, did grant a
hearing in the case but did not consider Carter's recantation. The matter is
now in a federal court in Galveston.
But we're coming right along here in Texas on the criminal justice front.
Many people thought that when two of three defendants in the Jasper
dragging case were given the death penalty it was first time ever in Texas
white people had been given death for killing a black. Actually, those were
the second and third times that has happened. And if that didn't make you
proud to be a Texan, what would?
Most of us have gotten into the habit of thinking people on Death Row can
get endless appeals and writs, and that you practically have to be proved
guilty 70 times over before the state can execute. This has not been true
for some time: Both state and federal law, and court decisions, have made it
dramatically harder to prove actual innocence.
In the famous Herrera case out of Texas, the Supreme Court actually held
that innocence was no reason to stop an execution. It is terrifyingly easy
to misconvict: Juries are still impressed by notoriously unreliable
eyewitness evidence and even testimony on forensic evidence can be highly
questionable.
The infamous "Dr. Death," whose testimony was so suspect that many cases
had to be reversed, has been succeeded by some "Dr. Negligence" type
witnesses favored by prosecutors.
Molly Ivins is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. To find out
more about Molly Ivins and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers
and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2000 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
