Three seats were up for election in the Texas Supreme Court, which handles civil cases, and three in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Democrats haven’t been elected to either court since the late 1990s.
Texas Court Of Criminal Appeals
Posted in
Guides
What to know before voting for Texas Court of Criminal Appeals judges
Texans will vote on three seats for the state’s highest criminal court in November. Here’s what the court does, who is running for office and what issues candidates are running on.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Execution halted as court questions whether Ramiro Gonzales should have been sentenced to life in prison
The jury sentenced Gonzales to death after a prosecution expert testified that he posed a future danger to society. The expert now says his data was wrong.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Crystal Mason’s contentious illegal voting conviction must be reconsidered, criminal appeals court says
Mason said she didn’t know she was ineligible to vote when she cast a provisional ballot in 2016, but she was sentenced to five years in prison. Now, the Court of Criminal Appeals says an appellate court that affirmed her conviction must look again at the evidence of Mason’s intent.
Posted in
Operation Lone Star
Texas continues imprisoning migrants without filing charges or appointing lawyers, court filings claim
Months after the problems became apparent, migrants are still being kept in prison in violation of state laws under Gov. Greg Abbott’s border security crackdown.
Posted in
Politics
Texas Republicans pressure court to reverse decision blocking attorney general from prosecuting election cases
Republicans from Gov. Greg Abbott on down are pressuring the all-GOP Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to reverse a December ruling that gutted the attorney general’s power to go after election cases on his own.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Texas executes Pasadena double murderer in third lethal injection this year
Rick Rhoades was convicted of killing two brothers 30 years ago, the day after he’d been released from prison on parole. His attorneys argued that racial bias in jury selection denied him a fair trial.
![“Judicial and prosecutorial misconduct — in the form of an undisclosed employment relationship between the trial judge and the prosecutor appearing before him — tainted [Clinton Young’s] entire proceeding from the outset,” Texas’ highest criminal court ruled.](https://i0.wp.com/www.texastribune.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Texas20Court20of20Criminal20Appeals20TT20MG2003-2-scaled.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1)
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Texas court tosses out conviction, death sentence after discovering a prosecutor also worked for the judge
Clinton Young was convicted in a 2001 Midland County murder in which he insists he was framed. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals said he was denied the right to a fair trial and an impartial judge.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Texas’ highest criminal court tosses death sentence of Raymond Riles, state’s longest-serving death row inmate
Riles has been deemed mentally incompetent for execution repeatedly in his decades on death row.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals will review Crystal Mason’s controversial illegal-voting conviction
The Tarrant County woman faces a five-year prison sentence for casting a provisional ballot in the 2016 election while on supervised release for a federal conviction. Her vote was never counted.
