After a Texas court reinstated his execution Wednesday, John Lezell Balentine took his final appeal to the Supreme Court, arguing that his death sentence should be reassessed in light of new evidence of juror misconduct and racial bias. The justices declined to block the execution in a brief, unsigned order with no recorded dissents.

Texas executed Balentine by lethal injection on Wednesday evening.

The court’s order denying Balentine’s appeal was the second time in two days that the court green-lighted an execution without comment.

Balentine, a Black man, was sentenced to death in 1999 for shooting and killing three white teenagers in Amarillo, Texas.

At one time, Texas wanted to pass a law that there only be one cell on death row.
When anyone is given a death sentence, the current resident is executed and replaced with the latest death sentence! 👍

Texas also attempted to pass a law that if you commit a murder and there are at least 3 credible witnesses, you go to the head of the line. No waiting! 😳
ZIP! POP! CHING!

Need to start bugging my local reps to push for this again! Great ideas.

Finally took him off the payroll, happy ending

as it should be ...we need to bring back public hangings ,and cut out the 20 years of appeals

Is there less crime in Texas for it?

it would cut down on the ones they let out of prison and they turn right around and do it again.(murder someone) . that happened in Ky just recently. he was in prison for murder, they let him out .and he murdered someone else .oh yea he was not a white person ..he be Black

Ongoing problem in our state - particularly Albuquerque.

I'm sure liberal lawyers will fugg that up.

Groids still gonna groid

In honesty, probably not at this time Jim. But, I would add, the death penalty isn't real effective if you never follow thru. The current process of appeals and such is strung out so long, there really isn't a deterrent.
And I understand the possibility of wrongful conviction. However, those cases are few and far between. Many of those wrongful convictions are decades old. DNA has advanced since then, and in my opinion, decreases the incidents of such. And yes, I realize it's not me or one of my family member's neck on the line.

This may be a drastic comparison, but if you threaten to discipline your child to get him in line, but never do, it typically doesn't curb the bad behavior.

JMO


Clyde

As opposed to say…. Chitcago Illinois???

Well duh !

Too quote Comedian Ron White “ if you come to TX and kill somebody, we will kill ya right back” 😜

[video:youtube] [/video]

There is at least one.

Jim

It's not supposed to be a deterrent. It's supposed to be justice.

BP...

The Supreme Court should NOT be involved in state governance, to include executions. This has been a terrible precedent and the Supreme Court should recuse themselves from all state executions in perpetuity.

POS lived 25 years too long, more than 25 actually.