In Harris County, Texas, The Death Penalty Is Applied With A Judicial Rubber Stamp

In Harris County, Texas, The Death Penalty Is Applied With A Judicial Rubber Stamp

6 years ago
Anonymous $cyhBy-qkd5

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20180624/11412340102/harris-county-texas-death-penalty-is-applied-with-judicial-rubber-stamp.shtml

When life is literally on the line, Texas judges are slouching their way towards another paycheck.

In these cases, Harris County post-conviction prosecutors have authored and proposed 21,275 separate findings of fact and conclusions of law and the Harris County courts have adopted 20,261 of the prosecutors’ proposed findings verbatim: an adoption rate of 95%. In fact, judges in Harris County have adopted all of the prosecutors’ findings verbatim in 183 out of 191 sets of findings, or 96%. In the vast majority (167) of those cases, the judges simply signed the state’s proposed document without changing the heading.