Former Texas Governor Mark White Approved Execution of Man Who Did Not Kill Anyone But Was Convicted Under the Law of Parties

Former Texas Governor Mark White has recently been in the news because he has changed his mind on the death penalty and now believes that a sentence of life without the possibility of parole is an acceptable substitute for the death penalty as a way "to make certain we didn't have unfortunate execution of an innocent person", (NPR, October 21, 2009, "Former Texas Governor Rethinks Death Penalty").

Our question to Mark White, "Do you still think that someone convicted under the Law of Parties but who himself did not kill or intend anyone to be killed deserves the death penalty?" "Governor White, do you regret signing off on the execution of somone who did not kill anyone?"

One of the people executed when Mark White was governor was a person who had been convicted under the Law of Parties, but who did not himself kill anyone or intend that anyone be killed. Doyle Skillern was executed on January 16, 1985. Skillern's case is similar to the cases of Kenneth Foster, Jr and Jeff Wood, in that all three of them, in their separate cases many years apart, were sitting in a car when a co-defendant killed someone. Skillern's co-defendant, Charles Sanne, testified that he (Sanne) was the triggerman, and that fact was not in dispute, as you can read in Skillern's appeal in the U.S. Fifth Circuit. The appeal also explains that

the charge emphasized that capital murder requires that the accused "intentionally kills or causes the death of another" while in the course of robbing another, paragraphs 6 and 7 of the charge permitted the jury to find Skillern guilty of the triggerman Sanne's killing, under the Texas law of criminal responsibility, as a conspirator in a robbery attempt equally guilty of the murder by his coconspirator if the killing "was committed in furtherance of the unlawful purpose [of the robbery] and was one that should have been anticipated as a result of the carrying out of the conspiracy."

From The Nation - Texan Executed for Killing:

Doyle Skillern, condemned to die for a murder in which the confessed triggerman may soon go free, was executed by lethal injection for the 1974 slaying of Patrick Randel, an undercover narcotics officer. Skillern, 48, died at 12:23 a.m. CST in the Huntsville, Tex., death chamber. Both Gov. Mark White and the U.S. Supreme Court had rejected a reprieve. Testimony showed that Skillern waited in a car while Charles Sanne, 51, shot Randel. Sanne was sentenced to life in prison.

Would Governor White testify in favor of a bill in the next session of the Texas Legislature that would ban executions of people convicted solely under the Law of Parties? In the last session of the Texas Legislature, such a bill was authored by Rep Terri Hodge and it passed the entire Texas House but died in the Senate after Governor Perry threatend to veto it if it reached his desk. The bill would have banned executions of people convicted solely under the Law of Parties.

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Peter Rothberg of The Nation endorses Rick Reed

Rick Reed has been getting several endorsements in the last week. Today Peter Rothberg of The Nation magazine announced his support of Rick Reed in his blog and invited the readers to support his campaign.

Hillary Clinton has staked her campaign on winning the Democratic primaries in Texas on March 4. But there's even more at stake in the Lonestar State than the fate of her historic candidacy. In Travis County, a heavily Democratic patch of blue in a state that has most liberals seeing red, voters will choose a new district attorney for the first time in more than three decades. Current DA Ronnie Earle is leaving office after thirty-one years. In an unusual race four Democratic members of his staff are vying to replace him. Because no Republican has filed for the election, the Democratic primary will determine the next Travis County DA. Among the field of former colleagues, one candidate, Rick Reed, stands out as "the most progressive candidate in a race with three other candidates who all support the death penalty" according to the Texas Moratorium Network in its endorsement of Reed, who has come out against capital punishment. He also calls for a moratorium on current death sentences. Beyond Reed's brave disavowal of capital punishment in Texas, which leads the nation in state executions, the longtime criminal prosecutor supports the increased use of drug courts and an increased diversion of drug possession cases into treatment programs rather than incarceration; he has vowed to continue with the prosecution of former House Majority Leader TomDeLay, whom Reed had a major role in building a case against, and he has committed to working with the Innocence Project to exonerate wrongfully convicted prisoners. Reed first worked at the Dallas County District Attorney's office. For twelve years, he assisted legendary District Attorneys Henry Wade and John Vance. In 1999, his career brought him to Travis County, where Ronnie Earle quickly assigned him to the office's Public Integrity Unit, in which capacity Reed had the responsibility of investigating and prosecuting public officials statewide. This is where Tom DeLay met the man determined to hold him accountable. Click here to find out more about Reed, and if you like what you see, click here to support his campaign. Co-written by Dinelle Lucchesi.

Daily Texan endorses Rick Reed

On Wednesday the Daily Texan endorsed Rick Reed for the Travis County District Attorney. Here is what they had to say about him.

Since Ronnie Earle has decided not to seek re-election after holding the seat for 31 years, a new district attorney is something many Travis County voters will see for the first time this year. Four qualified Democratic candidates, all assistant district attorneys, are vying for the seat, and because no Republican bothered to file, the primary election is the real deal - that is, unless there's a runoff.

Rick Reed, a UT alum, has made himself a standout in this race by being the only candidate to publicly oppose the death penalty (something a district attorney in Texas has never done before). Travis County residents would see at least a temporary abolishment of the death penalty if they elect him to office. While his opponent Rosemary Lehnmerg - who seems to have garnered the most endorsements, including that of Earle - has said "we should not perform any executions," she hasn't taken the initiative to officially oppose the death penalty, which we see as a weakness in authority.

Reed has also brought attention to himself by revealing to the Texas Observer last month that there was "bitter dissention" in the district attorney's office leading up to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's indictment for campaign finance violations, claiming that Lehmberg and other prosecuters were intimidated by DeLay's political stature. Reed, who is credited with building a large part of the case against DeLay, said he was the only person pushing to present the case to a grand jury.

Meanwhile, UT alum Mindy Montford, who has earned the endorsement of the University Democrats, seems to think becoming friends with the political sector is a good way of fighting corruption of state officials; she told the Observer, "We've got to educate the Legislature and the lobby that, 'Look, you've got nothing to be afraid of if you're following the law.'" And no wonder she's been the most popular in gaining cash and endorsements from politicians, such as former Texas Governors Dolph Briscoe and Mark W. White. The financial assistance she's gotten from her father, John Montford, who is a head lobbyist for AT&T Inc. and a former state senator, has put her in the lead of the money race.

On the topic of the death penalty, Montford said at a recent candidate forum that the district attorney must set aside personal feelings because "you can't necessarily dictate how you feel the law should be; it's what's on the books." We'd rather have a district attorney whose heart and mind are behind his or her actions, no matter how intimidating or difficult the circumstances may be.

Given the difficulty in choosing from four candidates of such high qualifications, we must rule out an endorsement of 46-year-old Gary Cobb, who has worked under Earle for 17 years, solely on the fact that he's the only one who hasn't worked in the state-watchdog Public Integrity Unit. We'd also be quite happy to see Lehmberg win the seat. But the district attorney is the sole prosecutor with the power to investigate state officials, and Reed has proven to be the toughest candidate to handle just that. We're a bit set back his finger-pointing in his interview with the Observer, but that only shows his aptitude and fearlessness in pointing the finger at public officials if need be.

Kenneth Foster on The Nation

Here is Peter Rothberg's blog post on TheNation.com:

In less than three weeks Kenneth Foster, an African American man sentenced to death in 1997 for the murder of Michael LaHood, is scheduled to be executed in Texas.

LaHood's actual killer, Mauriceo Brown, was executed in 2006. Foster, who was in a car about 100 yards from the crime when it was committed, was convicted under the controversial Texas state "law of parties", under which the distinction between principal actor and accomplice in a crime is abolished. The law can impose the death penalty on anybody involved in a crime where a murder occurred. In Foster's case he was driving a car with three passengers, one of whom, Brown, left the car, got into an altercation and shot LaHood dead. Texas is the only state that applies this statute in capital cases, making it the only place in the United States where a person can be factually innocent of murder and still face the death penalty.

Foster maintains that he did not know that Brown would either rob or kill LaHood. According to an Amnesty International investigation, there is evidence not heard at trial that the murder was an unplanned act committed by Brown, as the latter himself claimed before his execution.

In 2005, a federal district judge found a "fundamental constitutional defect in Foster's sentence" and ruled that Foster's jury had not been asked to determine if he had any intent to kill LaHood, and that this failure represented a misapplication of the law. However, the state of Texas appealed to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which overturned the decision.

The crazy thing about this case is that no one argues that Foster killed the victim. As the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's award-winning columnist Bob Ray Sanders wrote, the case "is further proof of how cruel, capricious, unjust and utterly insane our death penalty laws have become....Because of this tainted system, whether you believe in capital punishment or not, a man who did not plan or commit a murder will die August 30 unless somebody -- a judge, the Board of Pardons and Paroles and/or the governor-- has the heart and the guts to stop it."

You can help these folks get up the guts at freekenneth.com. Find updates on the case and urge members of the Texas legislature to stay Foster's execution and ask for a re-trial based on new evidence.