Title: Readings - Why Is Texas #1 In Executions? | The Execution | FRONTLINE | PBS
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Content: 2. Texas does not have a public defender system for indigent defendants, and instead relies upon court-appointed lawyers who likely do not have experience in capital murder defenses or appeals. Newton notes that incompetent defenses in capital murder cases are legion in Texas, and that, even in a death penalty appeal, bad lawyering is hard to prove. One decision, which turned down a defendant's habeas appeal due to bad lawyering, concluded that " [t]he Constitution does not say that the lawyer has to be awake" during trial proceedings. Furthermore, Texas was not obliged to provide lawyers free of charge to post-conviction habeas appeals until September 1, 1995, and the amount the state is willing to pay lawyers for these appeals is sufficiently low that most defendants still do not receive counsel for their appeals. 3. Until the early 1990s, Texas did not permit jurors to adequately consider mitigating evidence in the sentencing phase of a trial. Thus, there are a number of people currently on death row that may well not be there had information about their mental illness or youth been weighed. In addition, some other features of the Texas judicial system streamline the process between conviction and execution for death row inmates. Texas gives the bulk of clemency power to its Board of Pardons and Paroles and not to the governor.