Death Penalty

Texas also saw counties set the fewest new execution dates in at least three decades, according to an annual report by the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. Harris County was an outlier in that trend.

The same day the Court of Criminal Appeals stopped Robert Roberson’s execution to consider the use of “junk science” in his conviction, the state’s highest criminal court denied a Dallas County man’s challenge to the use of what his attorneys say is flawed eyewitness testimony in his case.

The Autism Society of Texas and the Autism Society of America have issued an open letter urging Texas officials to stop the scheduled October 16 execution of Robert Roberson, a man with autism who was sentenced to death in 2003 for the death of his 2-year-old daughter, Nikki.

The state of Texas is again trying to execute Robert Roberson, a man diagnosed with autism who was convicted of the murder of his two-year-old daughter, Nikki. They claim her death was caused by shaken baby syndrome. But there is mounting evidence that she died of an illness and not from child abuse.

After a roughly 20-minute hearing, Judge Austin Reeve Jackson rejected arguments by Roberson's attorney that his execution should be further delayed because of a pending appeal to the state's highest criminal court.

Attorney General Ken Paxton's office asked a Dallas County judge to set the execution of Charles Don Flores. His attorneys say they're not done trying to prove he was convicted using a debunked technique.

Moises Mendoza was convicted of murder in 2005 for killing a Farmersville woman and later burning her body.

El Paso County District Attorney James Montoya said that his decision in the prosecution of Patrick Crusius was driven by a majority of victims' relatives who wanted the case behind them.

Those housed in the O’Daniel Unit in Gatesville, including such names as Melissa Lucio, have had their lives touched by a particular Catholic order.

Steven Lawayne Nelson was condemned to die by lethal injection for the 2011 killing of 28-year-old Rev. Clinton Dobson. Dobson was beaten, strangled and suffocated with a plastic bag an Arlington church during a robbery.

Paul David Storey, 40, has been on death row since 2008. He was one of two men convicted of capital murder after killing mini golf course manager two years prior.

In total, Biden commuted 37 out of 40 death sentences to life without the possibility of parole. The group Human Rights Dallas said the president should grant clemency to all 40.