The Dallas Morning News. Dec. 30, 2015.
Could Texas be losing its appetite for the death penalty?
Maybe Texas jurors are finally taking heed of the constant stream of wrongful convictions. Maybe prosecutors find that seeking life without parole instead of capital punishment is much more palatable in today’s court of public opinion.
No matter the reasons, the fact that new death sentences were at an all-time low in Texas this year is reason to applaud. Could it be that the state is increasingly losing its appetite for sending inmates to death row?
2015 closes with only three death sentences issued, the fewest since Texas reinstated the death penalty 40 years ago. We hope this year’s stats are more than just a blip and, rather, represent a long-term trend of changing attitudes.
“People have become a lot more aware of some of the critical problems that persistently affect capital cases,” said Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes capital punishment. “Probably the most significant issue is questions of innocence.”
But this is still Texas. The Lone Star State alone accounted for almost half of the 28 executions carried out across the nation this year.
And the majority of Texas lawmakers on both sides of the aisle remain in support of capital punishment; the state Legislature once again rejected proposals to abolish the death penalty in this year’s session.
Still, there are positive signs that more lawmakers agree with this newspaper - which has since 2007 called for a moratorium on the death penalty - that the punishment is too unreliably and inconsistently meted out. In Austin, legislators approved new laws that established an innocence commission to increase access to DNA testing and overhauled the grand jury system. Those were steps in the right direction.
Texas’ declines mirror numbers across the nation. According to the Death Penalty Information Center’s year-end report, death sentences dropped 33 percent from 2014, with 49 people being sentenced to death this year. Just six states carried out executions, the fewest since 1998.
And Texas reported 252 inmates on death row, the lowest number since 1987, according to the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
Some of the expert theories behind the declining numbers? For one, more prosecutors are taking advantage of the life-without-parole option for capital murder defendants since it was allowed in 2005.
And perhaps most powerful: The Pew Research Center found that though the majority of Americans still favor the death penalty, support has dropped to the lowest percentage in the past 40 years - to 56 percent, down from 62 percent in 2014.
Confidence in the system’s integrity is waning. It should only follow that support for the death penalty follows suit.
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Galveston County Daily News. Jan. 3, 2016.
With open carry bagged, advocates load up for the next battle
The first days of “open carry” came and went in Texas without the mayhem and cordite smoke some opponents of the law - which, to paraphrase Townes Van Zandt, allows some Texans to wear their guns outside their pants - had predicted.
That wasn’t surprising. Most who followed the changes in Texas handgun laws over the past 20 years were confident the open-carry law, like the concealed-carry law that came before it, would have very little consequence for Texans as a population - most people would never notice the change had occurred.
Despite our state’s gun-loving reputation and whether it was by design or not, Texas has taken a long, cautious approach to expanding its residents’ right to bear arms. Until concealed handgun legislation passed in 1995, Texas had some of the most restrictive gun laws in the country. New Yorkers, for example, could apply for and perhaps obtain licenses to carry handguns, Texans couldn’t under any circumstances.
And far from being in the vanguard of open carry, Texas was the 45th state to allow it, and restricts the right to those who’ve met some fairly tight licensing requirements, while many states allow open carry without any licensing requirements.
The next round in the political debate about guns in Texas will be over those licensing requirements. Gun advocates already are arguing for “constitutional carry,” which would allow Texans to openly carry their handguns without having to possess a state-issued license.
The theory driving constitutional carry is simple - people shouldn’t have to ask the government’s permission to exercise their right to own and bear arms. In that situation the “right” is reduced to a mere privilege.
Applying that theory practically is more complicated.
You could argue the Texas experience with carry laws has been good because the right has been restricted to people with the gumption and good sense to obtain licenses. License holders in Texas must demonstrate an understanding of laws about using deadly force and that they know the butt from the barrel of a handgun.
Over the past 20 years, they have proved themselves to be among the most responsible and law-abiding people in the state. When the concealed-carry law passed, opponents predicted Texas jails, courts and morgues would be filled with the consequences of bad decisions by those licensed to carry. The opposite happened. We seldom hear of cases in which licensed Texans made bad or even dubious use of deadly force. And of the 50,000 or so felony convictions of all sorts judged in Texas courts in 2014, only about 150 were against license holders.
The question soon will become whether Texas should scrap that well-tested licensing requirement to satisfy a very strict definition of what constitutes a right. Proponents of constitutional carry will argue that other states allow it without much bad effect.
On the other hand, the state requires licenses of people who want to operate a Honda Fit, why not a Glock?
No matter where you land on the issue, the debate about carrying guns in Texas is far from over.
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The (Brazoria County) Facts. Jan. 3, 2016.
Open-carry bans are about property rights
Texans were given the right to openly carry their guns anywhere they wanted, which started New Year’s Day when the state’s new open carry law took effect.
“Anywhere they wanted,” actually, is a bit of an exaggeration, and the most ardent of gun advocates are not too happy about it. We suggest, however, they settle down because the ground on which they are offended is one of the cornerstone arguments they used in calling for the law to be enacted - it is their right.
Likewise, businesses and other private property owners have rights, including a right under the open carry law to not allow gun owners to carry a weapon into their shops, restaurants and homes.
Among those businesses are the Texas-based grocery chain H-E-B, Corpus Christi-founded fast-food giant Whataburger and national theater chain AMC, which recently took over the cinema at Brazos Mall - itself a business barring open carry on its premises.
Gun advocates will wish to frame the objections of those businesses and others as a gun rights question, when it truly is not. It is a business exercising its right to control what happens on its property, and it is not limited to guns.
Long before Lake Jackson enacted a smoking ban, many restaurants used their prerogative to separate smokers from other customers or prohibit them from lighting up at all. That was because a large number of patrons didn’t want to be sucking in cancerous fumes with their cheeseburger or manicotti.
Brazos Mall and other businesses also prohibit people from walking among stores with a cold one in a brown paper sack.
Among the businesses that will not allow people to open carry, incidentally, are many who continue to allow people to carry concealed weapons onto their property.
It is the “open” part - and recognition that seeing a bunch of modern handguns glistening from holsters will make their customers uncomfortable - that businesses are against, and as such are taking the necessary steps to prohibit the practice.
Those gun owners who believe their gun rights are being trampled are welcome to not shop at those businesses. The great majority of Texans - about two-thirds, according to a Texas Tribune/University of Texas poll last legislative session - who fear open carry will turn their local restaurant into a Wild West saloon, are welcome to skip the places where open carry is being allowed.
That is both sides’ right, and the Constitution does not place greater weight on either. That is what the open carry argument boils down to in its simplest form. It is not about the guns, but about the right of private property owners to control what happens on their premises - be it a resident’s home or a business.
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The (McAllen) Monitor. Jan. 5, 2016.
Immigration raids in Texas cause concern
As 2016 dawned this weekend, the Obama administration suddenly began immigration sweeps in three states, including Texas, targeting families and those whose immigration appeals had been exhausted.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson on Monday said in a statement that 121 arrests were made in Texas, Georgia and North Carolina in recent days and that all soon face deportations to their homelands, if they have not already been sent back. He said the deportations were due to an uptick in immigrants crossing illegally through the southern border, including the Rio Grande Valley, in recent months.
While we fully respect the federal government’s right to uphold U.S. court rulings, we again point out that federal immigration courts have been woefully understaffed and overburdened with cases since the immigration surge of refugees from mostly Central American countries began in 2014. And we strongly caution officials to thoroughly ensure that all cases were thoroughly adjudicated prior to deporting these immigrants.
We commend the additional steps taken by Johnson’s teams in providing additional female agents and medical staff to ensure the safety of all being deported. But in this presidential election year, we implore the Obama administration to ensure that all measures were properly done, such as a credible fear screening for claims of violence and abuses in that person’s homeland, that could legitimately enable that person to claim asylum and be allowed to stay legally in our country.
We certainly hope that administration officials are not just rushing to deport these immigrants because statistically fiscal year 2015 suffered a dip in U.S. deportations - the second lowest since 1972, as Johnson mentioned.
Critics, including local lawmakers, have repeatedly cited a lack of immigration judges and courthouse facilities for preventing due process by federal immigration court cases these past two years. An estimated 463,600 pending immigration cases are thought to be backlogged in our country’s federal immigration court system. It’s a number that grows by the day - dare we say, likely by the hour.
But careful and thoughtful consideration of each case is nothing less than is to be expected of our judicial system. The addition of
55 new federal immigration judges, plus extra courthouse facilities and support staff beginning this year certainly should help to alleviate some of the backlog. But it will take some time.
Funds for the additional judges were appropriated in the omnibus spending bill that was passed just before Christmas by Congress and ushered through with the help of U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo. These judges are barely being selected and set up in facilities and they should be afforded the proper time to adjudicate and thoughtfully process each case.
The omnibus spending bill also contained extra funds - totaling $1.6 billion - for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to identify immigrants who are convicted of a crime who may be deportable, and to remove them from the United States once they are judged deportable. We fully support the deportation of criminals who are deemed to be in our country illegally and who U.S. immigration judges have ordered deported and we view their deportations as a priority.
As Johnson, himself, has repeatedly stressed since November 2014, his agency has been keen to deport “felons not families.”
That is why these recent deportations struck us as curious when on Monday, Johnson admitted that the majority of deportations were part of “concerted, nationwide enforcement operations to take into custody and return at a greater rate adults who entered this country illegally with children.”
Johnson said those deported were adults and their children apprehended after May 1, 2014, illegally crossing the southern border; have been issued final orders of removal by an immigration court, and have exhausted appropriate legal remedies, and have no outstanding appeal or claim for asylum or other humanitarian relief under U.S. laws.
He also promised future such raids, which he acknowledged are controversial.
“I know there are many who loudly condemn our enforcement efforts as far too harsh, while there will be others who say these actions don’t go far enough,” Johnson said on Monday. “I also recognize the reality of the pain that deportations do in fact cause. But, we must enforce the law consistent with our priorities. At all times, we endeavor to do this consistent with American values, and basic principles of decency, fairness, and humanity.”
Above all, please respect our nation’s humanity.
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Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. Dec. 27, 2015.
Newspaper analysis of DPS searches warrants a third-party examination
The Texas Department of Public Safety plans to take a good look at the indication from a newspaper analysis that DPS troopers are more likely to search Hispanic and black drivers than they are white motorists who are stopped.
“Because this is such an important issue, DPS will be seeking to enter into a contract with third-party experts to review the department’s traffic stop data collection and analyses to determine if there are any recommendations for improving those efforts,” DPS spokesman Tom Vinger responded.
Good for the DPS. An objective look at the data is exactly what agency officials should be making, and having a third party study the matter is the best way to ensure objectivity.
The natural reaction is not to want to believe it, but an analysis like that warrants an impartial examination of the data.
According to the analysis by the Austin American-Statesman over the past five years, Hispanic drivers are 33 percent more likely to be stopped than whites, but the searches are less fruitful than searches of whites. DPS troopers are less likely to find contraband such as weapons, drugs or illegal currency in searches of Hispanics than they are whites.
Black drivers are 50 percent more likely to be searched by the DPS than are white drivers, but the finding of contraband was slightly more likely among them than it was whites, according to the newspaper.
The American-Statesman analyzed more than 15 million records from 2009 through last July in making the analysis.
Earlier this year, the Texas Tribune examined data of DPS traffic stops since 2009 and found the percentage of citations issued to Hispanic motorists by state troopers increased from 10.5 percent of total tickets in 2009 to 21.8 percent in 2014.
During the same time period, the percentage of white motorists who were ticketed by the DPS decreased from 71.1 percent in 2009 to 58.8 percent in 2014.
The changes in those percentages were enough to raise eyebrows and generate inquiries, but they weren’t necessarily evidence of racial profiling.
About 37.6 percent of the Texas population is Hispanic, but only about 24 percent of the DPS traffic stops and 21.8 percent of tickets in 2014 were given to Hispanic drivers.
Whites represent about 45.8 percent of Texas residents but were pulled over by the DPS in about 58.8 percent of traffic stops and were given 56.6 percent of the tickets in 2014.
The share of tickets given to black drivers increased from 10.6 percent in 2009 to 11.3 percent in 2014, according to the Texas Tribune study.
The statistics about DPS searches of black and Hispanic drivers could be more indicative of profiling, particularly in light of the more than doubling of the percentage of tickets to Hispanic drivers.
The press is the watchdog of society, and the Texas Tribune and Austin American-Statesman did a good job of making the statistics public.
Events across the nation during the past two years have raised concerns about racial profiling. If it has happened with Texas’ largest law enforcement agency, it needs to be acknowledged and dealt with. Along with the rest of the state, we will be awaiting the results of the third-party examination of the data.
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