Supreme Court to consider death series placing about DNA test

Case example

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on February 24 in the event of a man at Texas Death Row, who has long tried to achieve DNA test after convention on evidence that he says would free him. Ruben Gutierrez was sentenced to death for the 1998 murder of the 85 -year -old Escolastica Harrison in Brownsville, Tex. Gutierrez has maintained his innocence and says DNA from several evidence — such as a hair and nail cabinet from Harrison Finger and blood stains- would show that he was never in Harrison’s home. And if the DNA certificate shows that he never entered Harrison’s home, he claims, the jury would not have sentenced him to death.

But a federal appeal court last year gave up that Gutierrez does not have a legal right to sue, known as standing, to bring federal civil rights requirements that challenge the constitutionalness of the Texas laws that regulate DNA tests. Now the Supreme Court weighs in.

At his trial, prosecutors claimed that Gutierrez and two other men – Rene Garcia and Pedro Gracia – would steal $ 600,000 in cash that Harrison, who did not trust banks, stored in his home. Harrison was beaten and stabbed repeatedly with a screwdriver. Garcia and Gutierrez attacked Harrison, claimed prosecutors, while Gracia was the escape driver.

Gutierrez admits he was involved in the robbery, but he now insists he never entered Harrison’s home and did not attend her murder. According to Texas’ Law on Parties “, defendants may be convicted of murder of capital (which does not make them automatically entitled to the death penalty), even if they did not actually kill the victim as long as they participated in the underlying crime led to the murder. Gutierrez was sentenced Capital murder in 1999 and sentenced to death.

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state’s highest criminal court court, maintained Gutierrez’s death sentence in 2002.

When Gutierrez’s trial took place, DNA testing was not required in Texas in capital cases where the state sought the death penalty – a policy that has changed since then. Gutierrez’s efforts to seek that the test initially failed.

In 2011, the State Court of Court of Criminal claimed a state trial refusal of Gutierrez’s request for DNA testing. Among other things, it justified that the Texas Act for requests for DNA tests does not allow testing when the results of the test would only affect the judgment that a prisoner received, rather than the provision of guilt or innocence. In other words, the Texas Act would only allow the Gutierrez DNA test if he could prove that with this proof he would not have been convicted at all.

Gutierrez also brought a federal trial in 2020 against Luis Saenz, the district attorney who accused him, and Felix Sauckeda, Brownsville police chief. He challenged the constitutionalness of the state’s DNA testing procedures and argued that they violated his right to proper process – that is, a fair treatment of the government.

By 2020, the Supreme Court Gutierrez’s execution set a wait to give the lower courts a chance to consider his separate claims that he had the right to have a spiritual advisor in the execution chamber with him. The state eventually changed its policy, which led to the dismissal of these claims.

A federal court in Brownsville agreed that the Texas scheme, which steered DNA testing and relief after the conference, violated his constitutional right to proper process. On the one hand, senior-American district judge Hilda Tagle explained, Texas Law gives prisoners the right to submit another request for relief after conviction if they can present “clear and compelling” proof that they should not have been sentenced to death . But on the other hand, the tag of the state’s DNA testing legislation removes the ability of a prisoners to obtain this proof.

A shared panel for the US appeal for the 5th circuit threw the decision in February 2024. It found that Gutierrez did not have a legal right, known as standing, to bring his trial. Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was, on the 5th Circuit, noted that even if DNA tests showed that Gutierrez never entered Harrison’s house, he would still have been eligible for the death penalty because of his role in the robbery leading to her murder. Therefore, the 5th circuit justified that prosecutors would not probably order DNA tests, and therefore the courts cannot give him a means – one of the requirements for standing.

Judge Stephen Higginson disseminated from the 5th Circuit’s decision. He would have allowed Gutierrez to set his demands for DNA tests. In his opinion, there is no “meaningful distinction” between Gutierrez’s case and Rodney Reed, another man at death series in Texas, whose challenge for the state’s DNA test law Supreme Court allowed to move on in 2023. Higginson recognized “the majority’s careful tracing of the state trial history And fair investigation into what the named state attorney might or may not do “in Gutierrez’s case, but he did not believe that the Supreme Court’s decision in Reed’s case is related to” this nuance and distinction. ” , that a decision “Invalid Texas’ DNA testing procedure would significantly increase the likelihood of the state attorney giving access to the requested DNA test.”

The Supreme Court once again set Gutierrez’s execution in July 2024, just 20 minutes before he was scheduled to be executed, to give the judges time to consider his petition to review the 5th circuit’s decision. The judges agreed in October 2024 to take up his case.

In the Supreme Court, Gutierrez claims that Reed shows that a decision in favor of him can give him a means. The 5th circuit majority, he claims that “instead” formulated his own new test “to conclude that he could not get a means. Specifically, based on the 2011 declaration of Texas Court of Criminal Appeals that Gutierrez is still would be eligible for the death penalty, although DNA tests showed that he never went into Harrison’s home, Saenz and Sauckeda insisted that they would not allow DNA testing. To support his decision that Gutierrez has not been in charge of suing for federal civil rights laws.

But this analysis “badly misunderstands the law of standing,” counts Gutierrez. A decision by the Supreme Court, which indicates that the Texas Act, which Saenz and Sauckeda depend on refusing DNA testing, violates Gutierrez’s right to proper process, would give him the kind of relief that would give him to sue. Saenz and Sauckeda can always argue later in the State Court that Gutierrez, even with useful DNA results, is still entitled to the death penalty, but “what may happen in a future state case does not deprive Gutierrez standing in this current federal.”

And although Texas Court of Criminal Appeals concluded that Gutierrez would still be eligible for the death penalty, although the results of the DNA test showed he never entered Harrison’s house, Gutierrez, there is more evidence – never considered by state law – it would help show that he should not have been sentenced to death. For example, he says, he has evidence that the leading detective in his case lied to the booth, and that Harrison’s nephew actually “Masterminded” the act of robbing her.

In his Brief by the Supreme Court, Texas is pushing back Texas against Gutierrez’s proposal that the 5th circle adopted a “novel” test. Instead, it counts, “The Fifth Circuit’s decision represents a straightforward use of Reed to the facts in this matter. “

Gutierrez’s problem, the state claims, is that he has not shown that he would benefit from a decision in favor of his advantage. Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has not had once, but three times, over a 13-year period that “Gutierrez would not be eligible for DNA testing under state law, although he could use the results to challenge his judgment,” Because he would do be still eligible for the death penalty. In fact, the state emphasizes, after the court’s decision in Gutierrez’s advantage, Saenz has been dependent on this conclusion from the State Appeals Court to deny the DNA test.

In addition, the state, there are other state reasons why Saenz would refuse the request for DNA testing-for example, found the state court that Gutierrez was seeking DNA testing to delay his death sentence, which would separately exclude his access to the evidence. The State Appeals Court did not address this question as it maintained the trial’s order, which effectively left the conclusion in place.

Gutierrez’s argument that the results of DNA test and his additional evidence will show that he should not have been sentenced to death is too speculative, the state suggests. And in any case, the state adds to determine whether an defendant is entitled to DNA testing, Texas courts cannot consider new evidence, but instead only have to consider evidence available when the trial took place.

This article was originally published on Howe on the field.