‘My trust in the system is shaky’: Texas Republican says he would support moratorium on death penalty

DALLAS — In a startling revelation on Inside Texas Politics, state Rep. Jeff Leach stated he would assist a pause on all executions in Texas.  

What’s extra, the Collin County Republican says he has plenty of conservative colleagues who assist the dying penalty who would additionally again such a moratorium.

“Proper now, going by way of what I simply went by way of and seeing what I simply noticed, I’d,” Leach stated on Inside Texas Politics. “I’m, once more, a supporter of the dying penalty in probably the most heinous circumstances. However that’s contingent upon the system working, the system being reliable, truthful and dependable, us guaranteeing past a shadow of a doubt guilt of the inmate”

“And proper now, I’m not sure of that. My belief within the system is shaky,” he added.

Leach was on the forefront of stopping Melissa Lucio’s execution, which had been scheduled for April 27. However the Texas Courtroom of Prison Appeals halted it two days earlier than, opening up the potential for a brand new trial amid rising doubts about whether or not Lucio killed her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah, in 2007.

The Texas appeals court docket stated its resolution was based mostly on three counts raised by Lucio’s attorneys: whether or not Lucio is definitely harmless; whether or not the state offered false testimony at trial; and whether or not the state hid proof from the protection.

A decrease court docket will now evaluation claims that new proof in Lucio’s case would exonerate her and they’re going to decide whether or not she ought to get a brand new trial.

“And now the hope is that she will get a brand new day in court docket, a good trial in entrance of a jury of her friends the place the entire proof can are available and the entire issues that had been within the first trial are solved. And I’m very hopeful that that can occur,” stated Leach.

Earlier than asserting his assist for a moratorium, the Republican advised us a few weeks in the past he thought there may very well be different Texans on dying row whose circumstances deserve a re-examination.

Leach chairs each the Prison Justice Reform Committee and the Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence Committee and he says he’ll maintain hearings over the following a number of months that can embody lawmakers, protection attorneys, prosecutors, authorized specialists and legislation enforcement in pursuit of the “proper reforms.”

The Republican says they’ll examine interrogation techniques utilized by legislation enforcement in Texas, battle of curiosity points that will come up in dying penalty trials they usually’ll take a better have a look at the trial and appellate processes in an effort to establish any points with wrongful convictions and subsequent exonerations.

“We’ve obtained to take a look at each a part of our system.  And Melissa’s case, the place the system failed her at each flip, is a superb instance of that,” he stated.