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Texas judges have begged the state Legislature for years to come up with a process for determining whether death penalty defendants are intellectually disabled and therefore ineligible for execution.
After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that executing people with intellectual disabilities is cruel and unusual punishment, states were left to come up with their own methods of defining the condition. But the Texas Legislature hasn’t done so, leaving that job to the courts — resulting in a hodgepodge system of deciding the crucial question of whether a person facing a death sentence should be spared from execution.
Texas’ top criminal appeals court stepped in and created its own test for deciding intellectual disability for death row inmates, but in 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional because it used decades-old medical standards and a set of nonclinical questions the Supreme Court said advanced stereotypes, including how well an inmate could lie.
The Texas court later said it would use current science in its test, but the inmate whose case sparked the Supreme Court ruling is arguing to the high court that Texas’ system remains just as flawed as before.
A handful of Texas Democrats are hoping that the controversy and the threat of another defeat in the Supreme Court will motivate their colleagues in the Legislature to finally establish a procedure to determine if someone is ineligible for execution — before a capital murder trial even begins. Similar legislation has been proposed for years and gone nowhere.
“There’s a disconnect between the U.S. Supreme Court and our court down here,” state Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, told The Texas Tribune. “We just want to make sure that we’re doing justice, that we’re following the law.”
Thompson and state Sen. Borris Miles, another Democrat from Houston, have filed bills this session that would allow a capital murder defendant to request a hearing to determine intellectual disability before trial. Under the proposed legislation, if a judge determines the defendant is intellectually disabled — defined as having a low IQ with deficits in practical and social skills since youth — the death penalty would be taken off the table and the defendant would receive an automatic life sentence without the possibility of parole if convicted.
Texas still doesn't have a law on intellectual disability and the death penalty. Will that change this year?
Yes, and considering all of the changes that Texas has made then it is likely it will come this year.
After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2002 that executing people with intellectual disabilities is cruel and unusual punishment, states were left to come up with their own methods of defining the condition. But the Texas Legislature hasn’t done so, leaving that job to the courts — resulting in a hodgepodge system of deciding the crucial question of whether a person facing a death sentence should be spared from execution.
Texas’ top criminal appeals court stepped in and created its own test for deciding intellectual disability for death row inmates, but in 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional because it used decades-old medical standards and a set of nonclinical questions the Supreme Court said advanced stereotypes, including how well an inmate could lie.
The Texas court later said it would use current science in its test, but the inmate whose case sparked the Supreme Court ruling is arguing to the high court that Texas’ system remains just as flawed as before.
A handful of Texas Democrats are hoping that the controversy and the threat of another defeat in the Supreme Court will motivate their colleagues in the Legislature to finally establish a procedure to determine if someone is ineligible for execution — before a capital murder trial even begins. Similar legislation has been proposed for years and gone nowhere.
“There’s a disconnect between the U.S. Supreme Court and our court down here,” state Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, told The Texas Tribune. “We just want to make sure that we’re doing justice, that we’re following the law.”
Thompson and state Sen. Borris Miles, another Democrat from Houston, have filed bills this session that would allow a capital murder defendant to request a hearing to determine intellectual disability before trial. Under the proposed legislation, if a judge determines the defendant is intellectually disabled — defined as having a low IQ with deficits in practical and social skills since youth — the death penalty would be taken off the table and the defendant would receive an automatic life sentence without the possibility of parole if convicted.
Texas still doesn't have a law on intellectual disability and the death penalty. Will that change this year?
Yes, and considering all of the changes that Texas has made then it is likely it will come this year.
