Tarrant County sent more people to death row this year than any other county in Texas, accounting for half of the six new death sentences handed down in 2024, according to a new report from the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (TCADP).
This is the first time since 2014 that a Texas county has sentenced more than one new person to death in a single year, according to the report. Tarrant jurors handed down three new death sentences in 2024, while juries in Hidalgo County, Gregg County and Johnson County – just south of Tarrant – each sentenced one person to death.
In his winter 2024 newsletter, Tarrant County District Attorney Phil Sorrells highlighted the three death penalty cases.
“Make no mistake. As terrible as these crimes and these criminals are, it is never an easy decision to seek the death penalty,” he wrote.
The three people sentenced to death in Tarrant County in 2024 are:
- Paige Terrell Lawyer. He was convicted for the 2018 strangling of his former girlfriend, O’Tishae Womack, and her 10-year-old daughter, Ka’Myria Womack.
- Christopher Karon Turner. He was convicted for killing Anwar Ali after robbing Ali’s convenience store in 2020.
- Jason Alan Thornburg. He was convicted for killing and dismembering three people in 2021: David Lueras, Maricruz Mathis and Lauren Phillips.
KERA asked the Tarrant County DA's Office for an interview about how prosecutors decide to pursue the death penalty. A spokesperson responded with the text from the newsletter.
Before making the decision to seek the death penalty, the DA’s Office convenes a committee to review the crime itself, the defendant’s criminal history and whether they pose any future danger, Sorrells explained in the newsletter.
“My office and I fight for justice every day, whether in death penalty cases or misdemeanor cases,” he wrote. “I am proud to work with so many talented and dedicated attorneys, investigators, and staff. We all are dedicated to keeping Tarrant County safe.”
Before this year, Tarrant County had not sentenced anyone to death since 2019. County prosecutors sought the death penalty against other defendants in recent years, but those cases were resolved with sentences of life without parole, TCADP Executive Director Kristin Houlé Cuellar said.
“If Tarrant County prosecutors had their way, the numbers would actually be higher for the last five years,” she said.
Tarrant has now sent the third highest number of people to death row since 1974, overtaking Bexar County, according to the TCADP report.
With 78 death sentences since then, Tarrant is still far behind Dallas County with 108, and Harris County with 298, the report states.
The number of new death sentences in Texas has plummeted since a peak in 1999, when 48 people were sent to death row, according to TCADP data. Since 2015, new death sentences have stayed in the single digits.
That’s due to a few factors, Cuellar said. For one, seeking the death penalty is expensive. And in 2005, Texas adopted life without parole as a sentencing option.
“That is something that has given prosecutors even more discretion, and it's something that also has been palatable to juries," Cuellar said.
There are more than 170 people currently on death row in Texas, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
The death penalty is disproportionately imposed on people of color and is dependent on geography, the TCADP report argues.
The six men sentenced to death in Tarrant County since 2013 are all people of color, according to the report. Black people make up 47% of the death row population. They comprise 14% of the entire state’s population.
Some death penalty cases draw widespread attention and efforts to get people off death row. This year, state lawmakers and high-profile advocates like the novelist John Grisham and TV personality Dr. Phil have tried to save the life of Robert Roberson.
Roberson was convicted of capital murder for the death of his 2-year-old daughter Nikki. His lawyers and supporters question Nikki’s diagnosis of shaken baby syndrome — and argue that new evidence proves she died of pneumonia.
In October, a bipartisan group of state lawmakers forced a stay of Roberson’s execution by voting to subpoena him, or call him in to testify. That vote happened the night before he was scheduled to die.
“There are so many things that Roberson's case tells us about the death penalty, but it also just raises serious alarms about the reliability and fairness of the death penalty system, and just how many obstacles stand in the way of truth and justice," Cuellar said.
Governor Greg Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, both Republicans, have condemned lawmakers’ attempts to prevent Roberson’s execution. Paxton maintained Roberson is guilty in an Oct. 23 press release.
“Despite these eleventh-hour, one-sided, extrajudicial stunts that attempt to obscure the facts and rewrite his past, the truth remains: Robert Roberson murdered two-year-old Nikki by beating her so brutally that she ultimately died,” Paxton said.
Four death row prisoners have execution dates set for 2025. Steven Nelson, who was convicted of killing a pastor in Arlington during a church robbery in 2011, is scheduled to die on Feb. 5.
Editor's Note: This story has been updated to correct the number of people scheduled for execution in 2025.
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