Feb. 10
TEXAS:
The Worst Judges in Texas----In these courtrooms, justice comes to a
screeching halt
It's not a good time to be a Texas judge. President Bush's nomination of
Texas Supreme Court Justice Priscilla Owen to the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court
of Appeals remained caught in the craw of the U.S. Senate for four long
years, as her various shortcomings and the sorry state of the civil
justice system in Texas were bandied about from The New York Times
editorial page to the radio rants of Howard Stern.
She wasn't so much confirmed last spring as she was coughed out, like a
bundle of mouse bones from the beak of a barn owl. Meanwhile, the Court of
Criminal Appeals, our second most prestigious court, has become a national
laughing stock, thanks in no small part to Justice Sharon Keller's
toe-curling performance on the PBS show Frontline, in which she tried to
explain why a man exonerated by DNA evidence should have been kept in
prison. A nation of CSI junkies was left shaking their heads, muttering,
"Where do they find these people?"
We're tempted to reply (in Keller's defense), "You should see our crime
labs!" Instead, we present the following list, as an admittedly
unscientific demonstration that you don't have to look very hard to find a
bad judge in this state.
We began our search with no preconceived notion as to what makes a judge
"bad." Instead we talked to dozens of attorneys, including former
prosecutors and judges, to find out what makes them mutter around the
water cooler. We heard stories-virtually all off the record, for obvious
reasons-about incompetent judges, partisan judges, insane judges, mean
judges, and judges on a mission that had little to do with justice. The
following five, each in his or her own way, stood out above the rest. Bad
judges of Texas, we salute you.
Take heart and soldier on: The nation is waiting to hear your stories.
**
JAN KROCKER----Houston, 184th District Judge
In a county known nationwide for being tough on crime, District Judge Jan
Krocker has set herself apart from her fellow judges as one of the
toughest. 19 of Harris County's 24 criminal district court judges,
including Krocker, cut their teeth as prosecutors in the district
attorney's office. What's different about Krocker, a Republican in her
early 50s, is that she seems to have never really left. A dramatic case in
point was her intervention in 2004 in the death penalty appeal of a young
man named Martin Draughon. In 1987, while still an assistant district
attorney, Krocker prosecuted Draughon for shooting a man to death during a
restaurant robbery.
During his trial, Draughon's attorneys argued that the killing was the
accidental result of a ricochet from a warning shot, and that Draughon
shouldn't have to face the death penalty. Krocker got the conviction, but
Draughon's appellate attorneys later produced convincing evidence that the
Houston crime lab, already under public scrutiny for failings in its DNA
work, had blown the ballistics testing of the bullet.
That revelation was embarrassing enough, but what happened next was even
worse. Krocker-by now Judge Krocker-had been following the case as it made
its way through the appellate process. According to the Houston Chronicle,
Krocker contacted the appellate judge and insisted on testifying in the
proceedings. The state team did not want her help, calling her
intervention "improper and unnecessary." But Krocker was adamant, arguing
that her reputation was on the line in the case, the Chronicle reported.
If it wasn't before, it certainly was after Krocker's efforts became
public. The Chronicle editorial board castigated the judge, saying the
case raised "serious issues regarding her impartiality." At least one
defendant convicted in Krocker's court in an unrelated case requested a
retrial, arguing, in effect, that one prosecutor in a Harris County
courtroom was enough.
The judge in Draughon's appeal eventually allowed Krocker to submit
written affidavits, and then granted Draughon a new trial anyway.
How did it come to this? To be sure, Houston has always been a bad place
to be a criminal defendant, as we might expect in a town where the surest
way to the bench is through the district at torney's office. (To cite just
one telling example, in 2002 almost half of all the convicts in Texas
serving prison time for a crime involving less than a gram of dope came
from Harris County.) Dick DeGuerin, Houston's pre-eminent defense
attorney, says the tipping point came in the early 1990s, when the
district attorney's office went after a judge named Robert Lanford for
throwing out an indictment of a defendant accused of murdering a jail
guard. Legendary DA Johnny Holmes and his fellow prosecutors openly
supported Lanford's opponent in the next election, and just like that
Lanford was gone. The rise of a powerful victims rights group and a
rapidly growing Republican party resulted in a Harris county judiciary
that was uniquely attuned to crime victims-and voters. (All plea bargains
in Houston, for example, must be approved by the victim or the victim' s
family.)
Before long, DeGuerin recalls, it wasn't enough to just be Republican:
Judges began vying with one another to stand out for their toughness,
making headlines with unusual probation requirements, lengthy sentences
and the like. "There's so goddamn many judges that voters don't know one
from another," says DeGuerin.
"They think they have to do something outrageously mean just to get some
attention."
**
SALLY MONTGOMERY----Dallas, County Court at Law No. 3
Sally Montgomery was the only Dallas Democrat to win a race of any kind in
2002, when she was elected to Dallas County Court at Law Number Three. It
was a win worth crowing about-county courts in Dallas can hear civil cases
worth millions of dollars. But having Montgomery as a standard bearer for
the local party has proved to be something of a mixed blessing for Dallas
Democrats. For one thing,& nbsp; her Democratic credentials are pretty
thin. Montgomery, who is in her mid-50s, began her career in public
service as a Republican in 1996, when she was elected civil court district
judge. After serving only 1 term, however, she was booted out by GOP
primary voters in 2000.
Montgomery has said her troubles with the Dallas Republican party began
when the party chair asked her to do something unethical as a judge. But
attorneys from both parties say that the real reason that the Republicans
threw her overboard is that Montgomery is just a really bad judge. In the
2005 Dallas Bar Association judicial evaluation poll, a staggering 67 % of
attorneys responded "no" when asked if Montgomery correctly applied the
law. As one lawyer put it, "How can someone be a judge if they don't know
the law?"
That is a question that must have occurred to judges on the Fifth Court of
Appeals in Dallas, who have been kept busy correcting Montgomery's
mistakes over the years. Montgomery's campaign Web site proudly reports
that the judge has been reversed only twice since she became a county
court at law judge. That number is inaccurate:
According to Westlaw, she has been reversed, either in whole or in part,
in a total of four cases. (In a fifth case, she had an order vacated.)
That number still sounds pretty low, until you consider that the appellate
court has only considered 8 of her opinions on the merits. Including her
cases as a district judge, Montgomery has now been reversed 10 out of 19
times-or about 53 % of the time-in rulings judged on the merits, according
to Westlaw. (For comparison, the average reversal rate of cases heard by
the Fifth Court of Appeals is around 1 in 3.)
In addition to the compet ency issue, Montgomery also has a reputation as
something of a loose cannon. She managed to earn a rare personal rebuke
from the appellate court in a 2000 opinion issued in the waning months of
her tenure on the district court. An attorney who had publicly backed
Montgomery's opponent in the primary sought to have Montgomery removed
from a case still pending in her court. A truculent Montgomery ignored the
request and continued issuing rulings in the case, a move that the
appellate court noted "appeared to be motivated by animosity stemming from
a lost election." They concluded with a warning to Montgomery: "We do not
condone such conduct and expect it to stop."
Whatever her shortcomings as a jurist, Montgomery, who faces an opponent
in the Democratic primary next month, is known as a clever campaigner. On
her campaign Web site, she takes credit for leading&n bsp; the local
Democratic party back from the brink of ruin. Her campaign consultant,
Bruce Rothstein, suggested that her consistently low ratings from the
Dallas Bar Association are the result of some kind of coordinated campaign
against her by Republican-dominated corporate firms. Yet Montgomery had a
terrible rating in the bar poll when she herself was a Republican. (In
1999, 49 percent of respondents reported that Montgomery did not correctly
apply the law, one of the lowest ratings of any judge in the poll.) Sure,
she fooled them once, but how dumb does this judge think Dallas Democrats
are?
**
SCOTT BRISTER----Texas Supreme Court
Conventional wisdom has long held Nathan Hecht, who has been on the
Supreme Court since 1988, to be the leader of the court's well-documented
rightward drift. In recent years, however, Hecht has found himself in
danger of being outflanked on the right by a recent addition to the
nine-member, all-Republican court, Scott Brister.
Formerly the chief judge of Houston's 14th Court of Appeals, Brister, who
is in his early 50s, was appointed in 2003 by Governor Perry to fill a
vacancy on the high court, which is the court of last resort for all civil
matters in Texas. A conservative Christian who once provided pro bono
legal assistance to an anti-abortion group, Brister was not exactly a
stealth candidate. At his rancorous nomination hearing in the state
Senate, he responded "depends on the circumstances," when asked whether he
believed in the separation of church and state. As a district judge in
Houston in the late 1990s, he posted the Ten Commandments on his courtroom
wall and refused to remove them, even after he was sued by an attorney.
But First Amendment issues-thus far, at leas t-have not been the real
problem with Brister's brief tenure on the Supreme Court. The more serious
issue, court observers say, is that Brister doesn't seem to really believe
in the very system of civil justice of which he has managed to make
himself a chief administrator. As one attorney who has practiced before
him put it, "Brister considers juries to be part of the problem in Texas."
Brister has said he thinks voir dire, the jury selection process, is
largely a waste of time. He holds a similar opinion of expert witnesses
and opening and closing statements. In November of 2002, about a year
before his appointment to the Supreme Court, he shocked his colleagues on
the Supreme Court Judicial Advisory Board by launching into a 10-minute
rant about a proposed rule change that he felt unfairly benefited
plaintiffs' attorneys. "The attorney-client privilege is supposed to
protect lies," he declared at one point.
"Indeed, that's all it protects, lies," he said. "I think it was his
audition for the Supreme Court," one attorney who witnessed Brister's
diatribe said.
In fact, Brister's administration of the 14th Court of Appeals was the
best advertisement for his anti-plaintiff credentials. Efficiency was the
watchword while Brister was the chief judge, and plaintiffs' attorneys
learned to dread appearing before him. When the Houston Chronicle reported
that plaintiffs did especially poorly in the 14th Court of Appeals,
winning reversals in only 4 % of cases, Brister agreed that the figure was
"pretty low" but said "it just happened to be the cases we got that year."
Others have a different explanation: that Brister was on a mission to
overturn jury verdicts and to rein in what he considered to be an out of
control tort system in Texas. In 1998, Brister wrote a now infamous
dissent in a case called Schindler Elevator Corporation v. Anderson, in
which a family was awarded damages after their son was badly injured by an
escalator. Schindler sought unsuccessfully to have its appeal reheard by
the entire court.
Brister sided with the company in his dissent, arguing that the excessive
damages awarded in the case were a product of the jury's alleged desire to
improperly assess punitive damages on the company. But Brister then
launched into a discussion of the various legal issues raised by the
trial, venturing far afield into arguments that Schindler's attorneys
never even mentioned in their brief. Brister's ruminations prompted three
of his puzzled colleagues to write concurring opinions challenging
Brister's dissent, including a stinging rebuttal from a conser vative
Republican named Richard Edelman.
What could "suggest a greater lack of impartiality," Edelman wrote, "than
to decide a case based. on an issue not raised by either party?" It didn't
matter what happened in court, Brister seemed to be saying-he knew what
the defendant meant to argue. "Judge Brister," says one plaintiffs'
attorney, "is the great mind reader of the Texas judiciary."
Brister has continued his assault on juries as a Supreme Court justice.
Under the Texas Constitution, the Supreme Court is supposed to base its
rulings only on questions of law; it does not have the authority to go
back and consider the facts presented at trial.
Supreme Court justices, in other words, are not supposed to second-guess
juries about which side made a more compelling case in the original trial.
In his short time on the court, however, Brister has helped chip away at
this constraint on the court, in what most longtime observers of the court
consider a very alarming trend. Last summer, Brister wrote the court's
opinion in a case called City of Keller v. Wilson, in which he appeared to
be advancing a new, much more expansive framework for how appellate judges
should weigh factual evidence, supplanting decades of previous case law
and tradition. "You can get it down to black and white if you want to," a
former Republican Supreme Court Justice said of the trend in the court.
"Somebody who accepts the City of Keller as the proper philosophy-they
don't believe in the jury system." Nor do they respect adherence to
precedent, which has always been the cornerstone of American
jurisprudence. These days, as another former Supreme Court Justice told
the Observer, instead of stare decisis, "what we have is, 'Well, we're ju
st going to do whatever we want to do.'"
**
EDITH JONES----U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals
Edith Jones had very little experience in criminal law when Ronald Reagan
appointed her in 1985, at the tender age of 35, to the prestigious Fifth
Circuit Court of Appeals, which is for all practical purposes the last
stop for criminal defendants in our part of the world. Raised in San
Antonio and educated at the University of Texas School of Law, she had
spent 10 years doing mostly bankruptcy work for a blue chip Houston firm,
along with a year as general counsel of the Texas Republican Party. She
has since come to see the criminal justice system, she said in a 2003
speech to the Federalist Society, as a "cat and mouse" game, the result of
years of overreaching by the Supreme Court in its effort to protect the
rights of defendants. In her 20 years on the bench, Jones has d one her
dead-level best to crush as many mice as possible, dramatically raising
the bar for appellate relief in the process. Along the way, she has become
something of a star in conservative legal circles, having been mentioned
as a possible candidate for every opening on the Supreme Court since the
late 1980s.
She has also become something of a celebrity-though for different
reasons-among the small circle of dedicated attorneys who do death penalty
appeals in Texas. Jones is best known for her opinions in the infamous
"sleeping lawyer" case, in which a defendant named Calvin Burdine was
granted a new trial after jurors testified that his court-appointed
attorney had slept through portions of the original trial.
In 2000 a 3-judge panel that included Edith Jones overturned the ruling,
with Jones infamously opining that it was "impossible to determine" whet
her the attorney's naps had actually hurt Burdine's chances at trial. When
the entire Fifth Circuit met to reconsider her ruling the following year,
however, Jones' opinion was reversed and Burdine was granted a new trial.
An unabashed Jones joined in a dissent that stood by her original
reasoning, which by now had become national news. "The thing about Edith
Jones is, she doesn't really change her mind," one attorney said.
A mentally retarded inmate named Walter Bell was also unfortunate enough
to draw Jones on his original appellate panel, which meant she remained
attached to his case throughout a lengthy appellate process.
(Bell spent more than 25 years on death row.) She wrote an opinion in 1988
that blasted Bell's attorney for waiting until the last minute to file a
habeas petition, a transgression that she compared, in overheated
language, to the murder itself. ("The veil of civility that must protect
us in society has twice been torn here," she wrote.) In a speech, Jones
once argued that anyone who can plan a crime is by definition not mentally
retarded. Fortunately, the United States Supreme Court did not share her
opinion, and Bell's sentence was eventually commuted to life after he was
officially found to be mentally retarded.
Like Judge Brister, Judge Jones believes in expediency. In December of
1998, federal judge Sam Sparks of Austin issued stays of execution to 2
inmates with imminent execution dates, Danny Lee Barber and Stanley
Faulder, after they challenged the constitutionality of the state's
clemency procedure. The state appealed both stays to the Fifth Circuit,
where a different three-judge panel was assigned to each inmate. Barber's
panel upheld the stay, but Faulder's panel, led by Edith Jones, did not.
As Barber's attorney, University of Houston law professor David Dow,
recalls in his book Machinery of Death, "Both inmates had raised the
identical legal claim; indeed, the exact same pleadings were used by both
sets of lawyers-all that differed was the name of the party seeking
relief." Faulder's panel added a footnote to its order, Dow continued,
"acknowledging that it was aware that a different group of judges had, on
the previous day, halted an execution on the same grounds." By
long-standing tradition, circuit court panels are supposed to respect and
adhere to rulings made by one another, unless and until the entire court
meets to overturn a ruling. Yet Faulder's panel gave no explanation for
why it was refusing to follow suit. The author of that footnote? Edith
Jones. (The U.S. Supreme Court granted Faulder a stay shortly the
reafter.)
In recent years, Jones (who is now the chief judge on the Fifth Circuit)
has hit the conservative lecture circuit, where she has criticized the
Supreme Court for decisions in a host of areas, from rulings on family law
to pornography. She has gone on the record enough times to ensure some
tough sledding if she ever got in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee
as a candidate for the highest court in the land. But the word around
Houston is that Jones, despite her high profile, has not been a serious
candidate for the Supreme Court for a long time. It wasn't the sleeping
lawyer case that did her in, observers say, it was her performance in a
case involving a sexual harassment claim. After hearing testimony that a
woman had endured, among other things, a co-worker pinching her breast at
work, Jones retorted, "Well, he apologized." Nominating a woman to the
nation's highest court loses some of its luster when the candidate in
question is widely considered to be hostile to women in general.
**
FIDENCIO GUERRA, JR.---- Edinburg, Visiting State District Judge
In 1992, Texas Lawyer reported that there was a new district judge in
Edinburg named Fidencio Guerra, Jr. who spoke to attorneys during trial
through sock puppets. Puppets are cute when Mr. Rogers uses them, but
Judge Guerra is no Mr. Rogers. In a 1991 case described by Texas Lawyer,
Guerra heard an application from a woman seeking a restraining order
against her husband, who had a history of abusing her. After listening to
her harrowing tale, Guerra ordered the abusive husband to hold his wife's
hand and get down on his knees and apologize to her. Then he denied the
woman's request, the magazine reported, saying, "If he hits her again,
well, she can always file assault charges, and if he hits her hard enough,
she can file aggravated assault. And if he kills her, you can put him away
for murder." Guerra told Texas Lawyer that a local women's shelter was
pressuring women to apply for protective orders, in what he called an
"abuse of the system." In another case, he granted a protective order, but
only after taking a poll of everyone present in his crowded courtroom (the
majority of whom were present for unrelated cases) and following the
result of the vote.
It seemed that almost everybody- from the district attorney, to fello
judges, to women's advocates-wanted Guerra gone, and the judge failed to
win a second term in office. So why, 14 years later, is he still on the
bench? Shortly after the voters threw him out, Guerra, who is the son of
one of the Valley's most respected judges, was appointed to a spe cial
auxiliary court that handles primarily drug felonies. Such judgeships are
common in the Valley, where drug prosecutions clog the docket, and are
typically filled not by popular election, but by a board of local judges.
Once back in his black robe, Guerra was up to his old tricks. In 1997, his
court coordinator accused him of sexual harassment. The complaint was
upheld by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, but Guerra won a
summary judgment in a subsequent lawsuit by his accuser, who is now a
local justice of the peace.
In court, Guerra is known for making lewd or off-color comments to
defendants and witnesses. "He's just an obnoxious human being," said one
longtime court observer. Last fall, a young probationer named Enrique
Vargas appeared before the judge. Noting that Vargas' wife had come to
court with him, Judge Guerra asked the man to tell the court what his wife
called him in bed, according to a witness. Judge Guerra told the Observer
that he recalled the incident, but that the question was merely part of an
effort to determine what conditions to put on Vargas' probation. "I don't
humiliate anybody," he said.
Last December, after what he considered to be a particularly capricious
ruling, District Attorney Rene Guerra (no relation) unsuccessfully sought
to have Judge Guerra removed from all of his cases. "The losing side is
never going to be happy if they feel the rulings are unfair," the District
Attorney said.
After a decade of impunity, it seems that Judge Guerra will finally have
to face the voters once again. In January he put his name in the ring for
an elected county court at law seat. The local board of judges made him
step down from his auxiliary court assignment when he declared his
candidacy, so Guerra is-for now at least-off the bench.
A seat on a county court is a step down from a district judgeship, but
Guerra, who is now 58, has complained that he was not receiving benefits
or vacation in his appointed position. Depending on what the voters
decide, he may end up with a longer vacation than he had originally
anticipated.
Former Observer editor Nate Blakeslee is the author of Tulia: Race,
Cocaine and Corruption in a Small Texas Town (PublicAffairs).
**
DISHONORABLE MENTION
ED SELF----Tulia, District Judge
Ed Self, a Republican, presided over the majority of the trials in the
infamous Tulia drug sting of 1999. It took over 3 years and millions of
dollars worth of legal work to overturn those convictions and expose Tom
Coleman, the narc in the case, as a liar. Self could have stopped the
whole charade in the winter of 2000, when he witnessed Coleman lying on
the stand in one of the early trials.
Instead, Self's questionable rulings at trial helped the prosecution hold
the sting together as the truth about Coleman threatened to surface time
and again. In the aftermath, Coleman was convicted of perjury, and the
district attorney was sanctioned by the state bar, but Self is still on
the bench, unscathed by the whole affair.
**
OSCAR TULLOS----Brownsville, Justice of the Peace
Judge Tullos, a Democrat, holds the record for the most public sanctions
by a Texas judge over the last five years, which is pretty impressive when
you consider that the State Commission on Judicial Conduct monitors over
3,500 judges from municipal courts all the way up to the Texas Supreme
Court. Tullos, who once threw a woman and her 7-year-old child into a
holding cell to make a point about truancy laws, h as been ordered to
complete "additional education"-the judicial equivalent of detention
hall-several times, but it never seems to take.
**
TIM WRIGHT & SUZANNE BROOKS----Williamson County, County Courts at Law
The law says that anyone facing jail time is entitled to a court-appointed
attorney if they cannot afford to hire one of their own.
This includes misdemeanor offenses, the most serious of which can land a
person in jail for up to a year. According to data gathered by the Texas
Criminal Justice Coalition, Williamson County, just north of Austin,
reported providing attorneys in only about 7 % of misdemeanor cases, the
lowest rate in the state for counties with more than 5,000 misdemeanor
cases per year. (The statewide average was 30 %.) After months of court
observation, Dominic Gonzales of TCJC believes he has solved this riddle:
He says misdemeanor defendants in the Williamson County courts presided
over by Judge Wright and Judge Brooks, both Republicans, are
systematically discouraged from seeking counsel, from the moment they step
into the courtroom until they appear before the judge. Gonzales observed
Judge Brooks on more than one occasion simply denying defendants straight
out, without making an effort to determine their indigent status. "If
they're standing on 2 legs," Gonzales said, "she'll tell them, 'We'll set
you for trial in 3 weeks, and you can go find a job between now and
then.'"
**
BETTY BROCK BELL----Houston, Justice of the Peace
After 20 years on the bench, Judge Bell, a Democrat, was suspended last
March for illegally obtaining a handicap parking permit by using her dead
mother's name. Even before her indictment, she had a 77.4 % "poor" rating
in the 2003 Houston Bar Association Poll, making her the lowest rated
judge in Houston that year, by a wide margin.
(source: Texas Observer)
********************
Death row inmate Sells discusses crimes in exclusive interview
Earlier this week, convicted killer Tommy Lynn Sells was given his
execution date by a judge in Del Rio, the same place where a jury found
him guilty of killing a young girl.
KENS 5 traveled to the Val Verde County Jail and sat down with Sells, in
what might be his last interview before he's put to death in May.
"I killed someone, they're killing me," Sells said.
It was New Year's Eve 1999 when an intruder climbed through a window and
into a mobile home on Lake Amistad, just outside of Del Rio, where
10-year-old Krystal Surles and 13-year-old Kaylene "Katy" Harris were
sleeping.
The throats of both Krystal and Katy were slashed, and Katy died.
"2 young girls, we'd never had a crime of this brutality occurring
anywhere in this county," Val Verde County Sheriff D'Wayne Jernigan said.
Krystal pretended she was dead, and later helped investigators identify
Sells.
"What happened to this little girl changed next year and the year after,"
Sells said. "I ain't gonna be out there hurting no one."
When asked if he was talking about Katy, Sells said, "Yes ma'am. Because
of her death, there won't be no more."
Before Katy was killed, there were many other victims.
In April 1999, San Antonio's Fiesta was in full swing when little Mary Bea
Perez was snatched from her grandmother's grasp. Days later, Mary's body
was found along a nearby railroad trestle. Sells is willing to confess to
her murder, but not willing to talk about why he did it.
"You know what, I'm not going to drag that little girl over the coals no
more," he said. "I took a life sentence. I stepped up and said I done
that. Closure's been done on that."
Now set to die May 17, Sells said the drug-induced fog that filled his
mind before he was caught has cleared, and his conscience could help other
families find closure as well.
When asked if there were families with unsolved murders that Sells may
know something about, he said there were. And investigators have all they
need.
"Most everything that can be gleaned from him as an individual -
fingerprint, DNA," Jernigan said. "He can be gone and we can still solve
crimes."
There's something else Sells can provide before he dies - insight into
what turns a man into a serial killer. Sells called himself
Coast-to-Coast, referring to the locations where his murders were
committed. More than 15 murder cases have enough evidence against Sells to
go to trial, but he's suspected in as many as 70 deaths.
Sells said his life started to unravel at age 7, when he was sexually
abused by a relative. The abuse continued until he was 14 years old, when
he tried to reach out to a school counselor.
"That counselor wrote plain as day, 'If you don't help this kid, we're
gonna lose him,'" Sells said.
On death row, Sells has found God, his mother, a girlfriend who visits him
regularly, and the need to write poetry, with the final chapter of his
life now being written.
When asked where he's headed when he dies, Sells said, "Where am I going?
I'm going to heaven. Society gave me their judgment. I've got no choice
but to accept it. Now it's between me and my maker."
The interview lasted about 2 hours, during which Sells refused to say he
was sorry. He said if he did apologize and show remorse, people would
throw stones.
Sells said he won't fight his execution, and will go to his death on May
17 without a last statement.
(source: KENS 5 Eyewitness News)
***************
Triple slaying case goes to DA----Course of action to be decided after
review
District Attorney John Smith said his office will present the case against
Leo Angel Luna, charged with 3 counts of capital murder and 1 count of
aggravated assault, to a grand jury on Feb. 27.
Smith said that after he and his senior lawyers review the case, he will
decide what course of action to take before the grand jury.
"We'll present all the info to the grand jury," he said. "We'll give them
the options - where the death penalty is certainly an option."
Leo Angel Luna is charged in connection with the shooting deaths of his
estranged common-law wife, Diana Ponce, 19, her mother Blanca, 49, and
Dianas unborn child, Lydia, who was pronounced dead after being delivered
through an emergency Caesarian section.
Luna is also charged with aggravated assault in connection with the
shooting of Diana Ponces brother, William Ponce, 21. William is currently
recovering with his family and is awaiting additional surgeries, according
to his uncle, Socorro Pando.
Smith said the Odessa Police Department delivered the case to his office
Wednesday.
In a January jailhouse interview, Luna admitted to trying to kill William
Ponce but said that he accidentally fired the shots that hit Diana and
Blanca because of struggling with William.
Local attorney David Zavoda has been appointed to represent Luna. Zavoda
wouldnt comment on Lunas interview, adding that he has instructed Luna to
remain silent.
"Whether they wish to exercise that is entirely up to them," Zavoda said.
"I'm not either going to confirm or deny anything he may have told you."
(source: Odessa American)
***************
Capital murder charges sought in man's death
A couple currently jailed in Mississippi for the July stabbing death of a
53-year-old Hattiesburg, Miss., man now face capital murder charges in
connection with the robbery and slaying of a Fort Worth man found stabbed
more than a dozen times in his home that same month.
Fort Worth homicide detectives Mike Carroll and Cheryl Johnson traveled to
Mississippi this week to interview and obtain DNA samples from Angela
Rigdon, 34, and Robert Wayne Bounds, 33, in connection with the robbery
and slaying of Eduardo Delarosa.
"We're seeking capital murder charges against one or both," homicide Sgt.
J.D. Thornton said. "We still have more interviews to conduct and we also
have DNA testing to be done."
Delarosa, 45, was found dead on the kitchen floor of his home in the 3900
block of Lisbon Street on the morning of July 16 by his teen-age son. He
had been stabbed more than a dozen times in the front and back and had the
blade of a knife broken off in his back.
Irma Delarosa, the victim's oldest daughter, said the family was relieved
about the progress being made in the case.
"If it's them, I just hope they get what's coming to them," Irma Delarosa
said. "I hope it was worth it. They took my dad for no reason, they took a
wonderful man for no reason."
The couple have been jailed since July 26, when they were arrested in Long
Beach, Calif., on warrants for the murder of Stuart Milam.
Milam was found slain in his Hattiesburg home July 18 after a neighbor
called police, concerned that he had not seen Milam for about a week.
Milam's neck had been cut and his car, a 2005 Kia Sorento, was missing.
When they were found in California, Rigdon and Bounds were in Milam's car
in a hospital parking garage, Hattiesburg police said.
Thornton said investigators believe that the couple, after killing Milam,
passed through Texas on their way to California and stopped at Delarosa's
home.
Delarosa's son, Joseph, has previously told the Star-Telegram that he had
stopped by his home on the night of July 15 to pick something up. The teen
said he saw a woman, whom he had seen once washing clothes at the house,
talking to his father in the teen's bedroom.
Joseph Delarosa said that as he walked out the front door to leave, he
passed an unknown man entering the home. He assumed the man was a friend
of the woman or his father.
The next morning, Delarosa returned to his house about 6 a.m. to find his
father dead on the kitchen floor, with signs of a violent struggle around
the body.
Neighbors told Carroll that they'd seen the woman visiting a neighbor of
Delarosa's, but only knew the woman by the first name of "Angie."
Composites of the couple were published in the Star-Telegram in October.
Thornton said that after several months of interviews trying to determine
Angie's full name, Carroll talked to a Florida woman whose son had
attended an elementary school in Alvarado with Rigdon's children. Through
the school, Carroll learned Angie's full name, Thornton said.
Carroll eventually found Rigdon's ex-husband in Burleson. The ex-husband
told the investigator that Rigdon was in police custody in Mississippi.
Fort Worth police checked with Mississippi authorities and learned that
Rigdon was being held at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in
Pearl on a 4-year sentence for possession of a controlled substance.
Carroll and Johnson met with Rigdon on Monday, and through that interview,
also identified Bounds as a potential suspect.
Detectives also met that day with Bounds, who is being held at the
Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman for a conviction of burglary of
a vehicle.
Thornton declined to comment on what the suspects told detectives but
confirmed that DNA samples were taken from both suspects. Police have
previously said that they recovered a long strand of blond hair from the
body of Delarosa.
"Those samples will be compared to evidence that was recovered at the
scene," Thornton said.
(source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
*************
Jury will continue deliberations today in Michael Moore capital murder
trial----Deliberations stopped after nearly 11 hours on Thursday
In Georgetown, the jury weighing capital murder charges against Michael
Keith Moore deliberated for nearly 11 hours Thursday but did not reach a
verdict before stopping at 10:40 p.m. They will resume at 9 a.m. today.
The 9 women and 3 men on the jury left the courthouse in a 15-passenger
van about 11 p.m. and will be sequestered in a hotel until this morning.
In a change of procedure, the jury met in the courtroom rather than in the
smaller jury room because of the large number of exhibits.
Moore is accused in the 2003 slaying of Christina Moore, no relation.
Deliberations began shortly after noon after closing arguments in which
Michael Moore's attorney said the case against his client is
circumstantial.
Prosecutors said the puzzle pieces point to Moore when put together.
"You've heard evidence of some amazing coincidences," said Jana McCown,
first assistant district attorney, referring to bloody boot prints,
missing jewelry and stolen checks that have been connected to Michael
Moore during six days of testimony.
Christina Moore's husband, Robert Moore, came home midday Sept. 23, 2003,
to find her dead in their master bedroom closet, her throat slit and a
handcuff on her right forearm. She was 14 weeks pregnant. The couple's
daughter, Gracie, was in her crib unharmed.
"We go through our lives with certain beliefs, certain expectations about
what's going to happen with our lives," said Jane Starnes, assistant
district attorney, during her closing argument. "Christina Moore's life
ended in her closet, on her knees." More than a year had passed when
Michael Moore, 30, was indicted on charges of capital murder, felony
murder, aggravated robbery and aggravated kidnapping.
If convicted of capital murder, he could face the death penalty or life in
prison. Prosecutors charged him with capital murder because they say he
killed Christina Moore during a kidnapping, burglary or robbery and
because her death killed her unborn son.
It was the 1st time Williamson County prosecutors had used a 2003 law that
defines a fetus as an individual and allows charges for death or injury to
an unborn child.
But Thursday, as they read the charge the jury must decide, prosecutors
dropped references to the fetus. "Evidence is abundantly clear" that
Michael Moore killed Christina Moore while committing a burglary or
robbery, Starnes said.
Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley, interviewed after jurors
began deliberations, said prosecutors "made a strategic decision to avoid
that alternate legal theory" about the fetus because it is a new statute
that has not been tested in an appeals court.
In closing arguments, defense attorney Steve Brittain pointed to that
change as an example of how he said police and prosecutors "gave up" on
the case. They had to arrest and convict somebody, and so they turned to
Michael Moore, he said.
Moore, who has a history of credit card abuse and parole violations, had
been in the Williamson County Jail since February 2004 on a parole
violation when he was indicted in the slaying.
Until both sides made opening statements Feb. 1, prosecutors had never
revealed why they suspected Moore, refusing to release details before the
trial.
Throughout the trial, defense attorneys argued that the evidence the
prosecution says links Moore to the crime is circumstantial. Investigators
have testified that they did not find any DNA or fingerprints belonging to
Michael Moore at the scene.
A woman who testified that she saw a man while walking through the
neighborhood the morning of the slaying, whom she later identified in
court as Moore, said nothing about a large tattoo when she gave a
description to the police. Moore has a large tattoo on his left forearm,
Brittain pointed out.
"I do believe she saw somebody, and I do believe she saw that man,"
Brittain said, pointing to a police sketch of the man the woman described.
"He didn't have a tattoo, and it wasn't Michael Moore."
Brittain also cautioned the jury about the credibility of the
prosecution's final witness, inmate Chesley Pickel, who said Moore
confessed to him while they were in the Williamson County Jail. Pickel,
who is serving two concurrent 30-year prison sentences, was obviously
looking for a deal from prosecutors, even if he didn't get one, Brittain
told jurors.
"Do you believe this man ever does anything out of sentimentality or good
citizenship?" Brittain asked jurors.
(source: Austin American-Statesman)
******************
Jury In Michael Moore Case To Continue Deliberations
The jury in the Michael Moore case will continue deliberations at 9 a.m.
Friday. He is accused of killing a pregnant woman in Round Rock. The jury
was handed the case Thursday at around noon.
They deliberated for nearly 10 hours before the judge sequestered them for
the night.
Michael Moore is accused of killing Christina Moore, who he is not related
too.
In closing arguments Thursday, prosecutors told jurors Michael broke into
Christina's house in order to steal credit cards and checks. They claim
Michael handcuffed and slit Christina's throat. She was 14 weeks pregnant
at the time, and her 15-month-old baby was in the house. 2 inmates who
were in prison with Michael testified he admitted to killing her.
However, the defense says that there is no DNA evidence or weapon linking
Michael to the scene.
"You require competent evidence, it's how we avoid somebody going free.
It's how we stop investigations that ought to go on. All I'm telling you
is the evidence doesn't support capitol murder beyond a reasonable doubt,"
Steve Brittain, defense attorney, said.
Prosecutors are hoping the jury will convict Michael of capital murder. If
convicted, he could face the death penalty.
(source: KXAN News)
**************
85th court hopefuls say seat needs new blood; Langley looks to return for
5th term on bench
For the 1st time since 1998, the ballot for the 85th District Court
judgeship will be somewhat crowded when Republican voters head to the
polls next month.
4-term incumbent J.D. Langley has taken on two challengers - former Grimes
County District Attorney David Barron and political newcomer Julie May
Young - for the upcoming primary election.
Both challengers have said the seat needs new blood. Langley, who has held
the office since 1991, has said he still has a zest for the job and there
are still things he'd like to accomplish.
All three candidates are touting legal careers spanning more than 2
decades.
Voters will choose among the three March 7. Because no Democrats filed,
the winner is virtually assured the job in the November general election.
J.D. Langley
An elected judge for the past 20 years, Langley has spent the majority of
his legal career in the 85th District Courtroom.
"I believe I have excellent qualifications and continue to do the job," he
said. "I enjoy the work."
Langley, 53, graduated from Texas A&M University in 1974 but didn't go to
law school until more than 5 years later so he could serve as an infantry
officer in the Marine Corps. While an undergraduate student, he was
involved in the creation of the Corps of Cadets' Navy-Marine units and
helped start A&M's Parsons Mounted Cavalry.
Upon graduation from South Texas College of Law in 1983, he started a
local private practice and began serving as a relief municipal judge in
Bryan. A year later, he was hired by the Brazos County District Attorney's
Office, where he primarily practiced in the 85th District Court.
But Langley was a prosecutor for less than 2 years before an opportunity
arose to run for judge. County Court at Law No. 2 had just been created,
and in a November 1985 special election, he narrowly beat out Democratic
opponent Eugene "Sonny" Lyles by 16 votes.
The next year Langley ran again and was elected to a full term.
By 1990, the judge had set his sights on a higher court, filing to run
against Democrat Tom McDonald, who had presided over the 85th District
Court since 1978.
Langley was able to win 54 % of the vote after a heated campaign in which
he obtained support from District Attorney Bill Turner and then-Judge John
Delaney, both Democrats.
Until this year, Langley would be challenged only one other time -
triumphing over local attorney Bill Youngkin during the 1998 Republican
primary.
Among the hundreds of trials Langley has overseen during the past 15 years
were the Marcus Druery capital murder trial and the high-profile 1996
trial of former Texas A&M system regent Ross Margraves, who was convicted
of illegally using a state airplane.
Late last year, Langley joined 3 other judges in refusing an open records
request by The Eagle for e-mails between themselves and Patricia Bonilla
Harrison, whom they had appointed to a juvenile judgeship. One of the
judges, Randy Michel, was forced from office for exchanging illegal
e-mails with Harrison.
Last month, Langley did hand over what he said were all of the e-mails
between himself and Harrison. The messages showed what he described as a
"mentor relationship."
Langley has five children, ages 6 to 24. His wife, Jacqueline
Miller-Langley, conducts riding lessons at the couple's home with their 5
horses.
David Barron
Barron, 49, says he has plenty of fond childhood memories of sitting in
the 85th District Courtroom, where his father presided in the 1960s and
his grandfather for 15 years prior to that.
His family's legacy at the courthouse isn't a reason to elect him, but his
24 years' experience as a criminal trial lawyer is, he said recently.
"That has always been my dream," he said of the judgeship.
Barron's career has been split evenly among prosecution and defense work
and includes his 1988 election as district attorney of Grimes, Madison and
Leon counties. However, he resigned the top prosecutor spot during his
second term in office after running his car into a feed barn and pleading
guilty to driving while intoxicated
. Since the accident 11 years ago, Barron said he has successfully
received treatment for alcoholism and has been able to share his
experience with others who have drinking problems.
"Looking back on it, it actually was the best thing that ever happened to
me," Barron said, explaining that the experience grounded him.
Although he had previously run as a Democrat, Barron switched parties in
1998 when he made a failed bid for the Court of Criminal Appeals. He also
made a 1-day bid for district attorney in 2000 before retracting his name.
Barron has worked in Bryan since the 1990s, sharing an office with Travis
Bryan, who is currently serving as his campaign treasurer.
A 1974 Bryan High School graduate, Barron graduated from Sam Houston State
University in 1978 and from Baylor Law School in 1981. In 1986, he became
one of only a handful of local lawyers who have obtained a legal
specialization in criminal law.
Barron estimated recently that he has been lead counsel for at least 200
jury trials and between 70 and 100 appeals. He has had cases before most
of the state's courts of appeals and has argued cases before the Court of
Criminal Appeals and the Texas Supreme Court.
Among Barron's major cases over the past 2 decades was the death penalty
conviction of Robert Madden in 1986, when he was an assistant district
attorney in Leon County. As a defense attorney, he was able to obtain two
hung juries for James David White, whom Grimes County prosecutors tried to
convict of murder charges in 2003 and 2005.
As part of a plea agreement, White later agreed to a 20-year sentence for
conspiracy to commit murder.
Barron is married and has one stepdaughter.
Julie May Young
Young has wanted to be a lawyer since she was 13 years old, growing up in
Kentucky and living down the street from a respected appellate court
judge.
"It was the way in which he spoke about the law and the dignity of the
law," she explained.
Having now practiced law for 26 years and with her children getting older,
the 52-year-old said recently the time was right to try her hand at the
bench.
After obtaining her undergraduate and law degrees from Southern Methodist
University in 1975 and 1979, respectively, Young began working with a
small firm in Dallas in 1980. Three years later she moved to Brazos County
to work for A.W. "Head" Davis. Since then, she has worked at several local
law firms. Last year, she opened a solo practice.
Describing herself as predominantly a trial attorney, Young said she has
done some criminal work but has focused primarily on "just about every
aspect" of civil law.
A former president of the Brazos County Bar Association, she said she has
practiced in 60 different courtrooms, from justice of the peace courts on
up to the federal level. She has been admitted to the Northern and
Southern District federal courts, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, the
Texas Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Although she hasn't gotten a chance to argue before the U.S. Supreme
Court, Young did file briefs with the justices in the early '80s while
representing a serviceman whose ex-wife was trying to use a new law to
obtain part of his retirement benefits.
"I always say I won that case by act of Congress," she said, explaining
that the law was later changed because of her case and several others.
Young has also formerly served as chairwoman of Brazos County Legal Aid
and of the Bench and Bar Committee. In addition, she taught classes on
business law, real estate contracts and agency law at Blinn College for
several years before giving it up due to the demands of family.
Married to local title examiner Steven Young, she is the mother of 4
children, ages 12 to 19.
(source: The Bryan-College Station Eagle)
