Texas High Court Blocks Scheduled Wednesday Execution

HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) - Texas' highest appeals court stopped the scheduled execution Wednesday of a man about five hours before he could have been put to death in the 1989 slaying of a restaurant manager.

Steven K. Staley, 42, won the reprieve after lawyers argued that instructions given to jurors at his 1991 trial were unclear when they were deciding whether he should get the death penalty. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals sent the case back to a trial court.

Staley was condemned for the 1989 slaying of a Fort Worth restaurant manager during a botched robbery. At the time, he was an escapee from a Denver halfway house.

Wednesday's ruling came as the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans was considering an appeal from the Texas attorney general's office to remove a reprieve issued Tuesday by a federal judge.

State attorneys opposed defense arguments that Staley should not receive a lethal injection until questions about his mental competency were fully reviewed in court.

Staley was examined last week by psychiatrists who determined he was aware of his punishment and why he was being put to death. Those criteria were established by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1986.

A defense expert, while agreeing the convict knew his execution was imminent, said in a report that Staley was psychotic and had described himself as a part-time secret agent and inventor of the 1969 Chevrolet Impala.

This is from http://home.hiwaay.net/~dbennett/justice.html evidence that they do not make Texas judges like they used to

A Compassionate Sentence
Following are the exact words of a sentence handed down by Texas Judge.
The fact is Jones, the court did not intend to order you to be executed before next spring, but being as the weather is cold and the jail in such miserable shape, with much of the glass broken, and owing to the great amount of prisoners already in the jail and considering the hardships it would impose on the sheriff to have to look after you until next spring and considering the fact that there are not enough blankets for all the prisoners I feel as if you would undoubtedly not be comfortable in such surroundings.

Therefore it is the order of the court, that in order to alleviate your sufferings and provide the compassionate care a man in your present situation requires, that you should be hung as soon as possible tomorrow morning when the sheriff has finished his breakfast or as soon as possible thereafter.

This is an actual sentence handed down by Judge Roy Bean
Jose Manuel Miguel Gonzales, in a few short weeks it will be spring.
The snows of winter will flow away, the ice will vanish, the air will become soft and balmy.
The annual miricle of the years will awaken and come to pass.
The rivulet will run its soaring course to the sea.
The timid desert flowers will put fourth their tender shoots.
The glorious valleys of this imperial domain will blossom as the rose.
From every tree top, some wild songster will carol his mating song.
Butterflies will sport in th sunshine.

But you will not be their to enjoy it. Because I command the sheriff of the county to lead you away to some remote spot, swing you by the neck from a knotting bough of some sturdy oak and let you hang until dead.

And then Jose Manuel Miguel Gonzales, I further command that such officers retire quickly from your dangling corpse, that vultures may descend from the heavens upon your filthy body until nothing is left but the bare, bleached bones of a cold-blooded, blood-thirsty, throat-cutting, mudering S.O.B

Quotes from Judge Parker the Hanging Judge:

"Sometimes you will find good men involved in things (mob violence) of that kind. It is because they have lost confidence in courts and juries."

"I never hanged a man, it was the law."

"Murders are on the increase... I attribute the increase to the Supreme Court... the murderer has a long breathing spell before his case comes before the Supreme Court, then the conviction may be quashed upon the flimsiest technicalities. The Supreme Court never touches on the merit of the case."

"Gentlemen, the very power and majesty of this Government and this Law are in your hands. While it is not there in burning letters over the door, see to it that the maxim that "no guilty man shall escape and no innocent man shall be punished", shall be verified in this case, as it should in every case. You will retire to make your verdict."

"Sympathy should not be reserved wholly for the criminal. I believe in standing on the right side of the innocent... quiet, peaceful, law-abiding citizen, is there no sympathy for him?"

"I do not desire to hang you men, it is the law."

"At the present there seems to be a criminal wave sweeping over the country, the like of which, I have not seen before. It is due to the laxiety of the courts."

"I have no objection to appeal. I even favor abolition of the death penalty provided there is a certainty of punishment, for in the uncertainty of punishment following crimes lies weakness of our halting justice."

"Liberty and Life are precarious unless those in authority have sense and spirit enough to defend them under the law"

"The sword of human justice trembles over you and is about to fall upon your guilty head."

"When you return to the solitude of your prison... bring to your recollection the mortal struggles and dying groans of your murdered victim."

"I have this much satisfaction after my twenty years of labor: the Court at Ft. Smith, Arkansas stands as a monument to the strong arm of the laws of the United States and has resulted in bringing to the Indian Territory, civilization and protection."

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