Yet another Henry Wade era conviction is overturned on DNA evidence. Or as we call it in Dallas, a Tuesday.
Good on Craig Watkins’ latest initiative, too: reviewing all the older death row cases.
Meanwhile, former Dallas prosecutor Toby Shook who got smacked down in 2006 running against Watkins gets the WTF Award for his quote:
Perhaps he hasn’t thought this through, but essentially what he’s saying is, ‘There is one more court of appeal and that’s me. That’s going to be devastating to a [victim's] family.
Yeah, well how about a potentially wrongfully convicted man facing a ride on the Huntsville steel gurney, Toby? How devastating is that? And how is it comforting to a murder victim’s family to wonder whether the right guy got the Kervorkian juice, and wonder whether maybe the actual killer is still out there?
Agreed. Saying that you’re “tough on crime” and pumping up your conviction rate with innocent people is devastating to the taxpayers.
Exactly, the thought that even one innocent person dies is makes all of this necessary.
Shook is shaking because the truth about his…and Wade’s…record…aka ‘legacy’… is no longer ‘on the ropes’. More like ‘on the gallows’.
You made the Reason blog. Redeem this post for a free slot token at an Oklahoma casino. :bergman: