Posted on 11/08/2007 4:47:29 AM PST by laotzu
The wife of executed killer Michael Richard filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday accusing Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Presiding Judge Sharon Keller of causing the inmate's Sept. 25 lethal injection.
Marsha Richard of Houston claims Keller had no authority to prevent what would have been a successful appeal to stay her husband's execution.
The lawsuit says Keller violated Michael Richard's due process rights when she ordered the court clerk's office to close promptly at 5 p.m. on Sept. 25 before his lawyers could file an appeal. Houston attorney David Dow had asked for more time after having computer problems.
The suit names Keller in her individual and official capacity, as well as other unnamed defendants in their individual and official capacities.
Through her secretary, Keller said she had no comment. The judge has served on the Court of Criminal Appeals since 1994.
Marsha Richard seeks a federal order that bars Keller, the Court of Criminal Appeals and its clerk from stopping emergency death penalty appeals from being filed in either paper or electronic form. She also seeks unspecified financial damages, attorneys' fees and court costs.
"He was on death row, so chances are he was going to be executed. But to have your appeal denied for no rhyme or reason? That's wrong," Marsha Richard, 43, said during a news conference outside the Houston federal courthouse Wednesday. The home health aide married Michael Richard in 2002. "No matter what side of the death penalty you fall on, we're still dealing with human beings. Their lives are in the balance."
This week, the state criminal appeals court said it would accept emergency e-mail filings in death penalty cases in order to avoid a repeat of Michael Richard's nationally controversial execution.
"It's an admission by the Court of Criminal Appeals that what happened was wrong and it needs to be corrected," said Randall Kallinen, who is representing Marsha Richard. "However, that doesn't fix the problem of someone ordering the stopping of filings. ... We want an order from the federal court that says that this appellate court judge or any appellate court judge can't stop an appeal that is allowed to be filed under the law."
The morning of Michael Richard's execution, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to the chemicals used in lethal injections by Kentucky. That case alleges that lethal injections are cruel and unusual punishment, a violation of the Constitution.
Throughout the day, attorneys for Richard worked feverishly to halt his lethal injection on the same basis.
The lawsuit claims Keller's actions denied the condemned man his right to file a proper request for a stay of execution with the U.S. Supreme Court because the Court of Criminal Appeals had not had a chance to rule first.
Three other judges later said they were available that evening and could have handled Richard's appeal if they had known about it. The U.S. Supreme Court denied his request for a stay of lethal injection.
Richard, 49, was executed at 8:22 p.m. for a 1986 rape and murder.
Judges have "absolute judicial immunity," which means they cannot be sued for actions that take place within the jurisdiction of their court, said University of Houston law professor Peter Hoffman.
But that protection does not extend to administrative acts, which is how Hoffman describes what Keller did.
Still, because the judge followed standard procedures, he thinks she will be protected by "qualified immunity."
"I fail to see how this violated (Michael Richard's) constitutional rights. ... They're going to have to get over some significant hurdles to get the relief they're seeking here," Hoffman said. "That's not to say that she exercised good judgment. I think what she did here is unconscionable. I would have hoped that she would have exercised discretion and kept the clerk's office open."
I wonder what actual damages the wife alleges. It’s not like her husband had an earning potential.
Richard, 49, was executed at 8:22 p.m. for a 1986 rape and murder.1986. Rape. Murder.
His execution was long past-due.
Counter-sue this woman for wasting the time of the court with frivolous law suits and slap her lawyer with a huge, huge fine.
No kidding ... from the tone of the article, you'd think he was innocent; pure as the driven snow.
Well - if this works, does it mean we are free to sue the judges who let guilty people walk or the parole board who releases someone who goes on to commit more crimes - maybe even murder. This is a door that the law can’t afford to open.
Don’t know anything about this particular case, but from a point of view of pure statistics and numbers Texas has to be executing innocent people here and there.
Was his stint on “Seinfeld” really that bad??
No he was executed over the “N” word incident.
Well honey, what time did the office OPEN???? Seems your lawyers had all bleepin' day to file an appeal. When you wait til the last minute you suffer the consequences.
I don’t know. The professor in the story said judges have immunity from every aspect of their court behavior but not administrative. It seems like the wife’s appropriate target would be her attorney who failed to allow for delivery contingencies in the appeal. His case was truely one of life and death and he allocated time as if it were a real estate settlement.
That is what I was thinking - 20 years and it comes down to a filing deadline....I don’t think so. This is called grasping at straws over her guilty husband.
Well you have all the DNA stuff setting many convicts free, but this makes us look petty. But this is just a by-product of the Abortion culture. Don’t want a baby, kill it. Don’t want to work late on a friday night, kill him.
Oh really? I guess it could also be said that ‘From a point of view of pure statistics and numbers, you’re probably a troll on FR’.
Judicial candidate Randall Kallinen takes on right-wing zealots
Snort.
Her husband commits rape and murder, and she has the gall to whine about his final moments of physical discomfort and to sue a judge over it?
The appeal was based on some Supreme Court action that occurred that day. It's sort of hard to appeal in the morning based on something that hasn't yet happened.
And suddenly the wife is on stage in front of America after 20 years of appeals; etc. I smell; “I’m gonna make some money”.
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