"Setting a March 24 execution date also means that Mr. Skinner's pending lawsuit against the Gray County District Attorney in the United States Supreme Court, seeking the much-needed DNA testing, must now be resolved under needless and entirely artificial time pressures. Given that the District Attorney stands to benefit directly from that undue haste, it is especially disappointing that the court chose to press forward with Mr. Skinner's execution on March 24.
In addition, there is a very serious legal question whether the trial court even has the authority to set an execution date for someone, like Mr. Skinner, whose post-conviction challenges to his conviction and death sentence have never been heard by the Texas courts."
From statement released earlier today by Hank Skinner's legal team;
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BACKGROUND: The editor of the Texas Tribune says in a note that "Hank Skinner is set to be executed for a 1993 murder he's always maintained he didn't commit. He wants the state to test whether his DNA matches evidence found at the crime scene, but prosecutors say the time to contest his conviction has come and gone....... We told the story of the murders and his conviction and sentencing in the first part of this story." Reporter Brandi Grissom, author of the Tribune series on Hank Skinner, writes: "I interviewed Henry "Hank" Watkins Skinner, 47, at the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice — death row — on January 20, 2010. Skinner was convicted in 1995 of murdering his girlfriends and her two sons; the state has scheduled his execution for February 24. Skinner has always maintained that he's innocent and for 15 years has asked the state to release DNA evidence that he says will prove he was not the killer."
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Earlier today, Hank Skinner's legal team released a statement, as will be seen, which contained both good and bad news.
"Today, February 17, we received notice for the first time that the judge of the convicting court yesterday withdrew Mr. Skinner's previously scheduled February 24 execution date, apparently upholding our challenge to the previously issued warrant of execution as void under Texas law," the statement begins.
We are dismayed that the court chose, in the same order, to re-schedule Mr. Skinner's execution for March 24," it continues.
"This unseemly haste to execute Mr. Skinner ignores the growing public concern and outcry over the unanswered questions about Mr. Skinner's guilt. Now, more than ever, DNA testing is necessary to resolve those doubts.
Setting a March 24 execution date also means that Mr. Skinner's pending lawsuit against the Gray County District Attorney in the United States Supreme Court, seeking the much-needed DNA testing, must now be resolved under needless and entirely artificial time pressures. Given that the District Attorney stands to benefit directly from that undue haste, it is especially disappointing that the court chose to press forward with Mr. Skinner's execution on March 24.
In addition, there is a very serious legal question whether the trial court even has the authority to set an execution date for someone, like Mr. Skinner, whose post-conviction challenges to his conviction and death sentence have never been heard by the Texas courts.
We remain committed to obtaining the DNA testing our client says will prove his innocence, and will take every available legal step to that end."
Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;
