Rare Chance for Mercy on Texas’ Death Row

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faces execution under a law that blames accomplices as much as actual killers."/> <meta name="author" content="The Editorial Board"/> <meta name="tone" content="opinion" id="article-tone"/> <meta name="byl" content="By THE EDITORIAL BOARD"/> <meta name="PT" content="article"/> <meta name="CG" content="opinion"/> <meta name="SCG" content=""/> <meta name="PST" content="Editorial"/> <meta name="tom" content="Editorial"/> <meta name="edt" content="NewYork"/> <meta property="og:image" content="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055im_/https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-facebookJumbo.jpg"/> <meta property="twitter:image:alt" content="A rally to halt the execution of a death row inmate in Austin, Tex., in July."/> <meta property="twitter:image" content="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-videoSixteenByNineJumbo1600.jpg"/> <meta name="twitter:card" value="summary_large_image"/> <meta property="article:author" 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href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://www.nytimes.com/pages/opinion/index.html">The Opinion Pages</a></span> <span class="pipe">|</span> Editorial </h3> <h1 itemprop="headline" id="headline" class="headline">Rare Chance for Mercy on Texas’ Death Row</h1> <div id="story-meta-footer" class="story-meta-footer"> <p class="byline-dateline"><span class="byline" itemprop="author creator" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Person" itemid="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/opinion/editorialboard.html">By <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/opinion/editorialboard.html" title="More Articles by THE EDITORIAL BOARD"><span class="byline-author" data-byline-name="THE EDITORIAL BOARD" itemprop="name">THE EDITORIAL BOARD</span></a></span><time class="dateline" datetime="2016-08-18T14:11:01-04:00" itemprop="dateModified" content="2016-08-18T14:11:01-04:00">AUG. 18, 2016</time> </p> <div class="story-meta-footer-sharetools"> <div id="sharetools-story-meta-footer" aria-label="tools" role="group" class="sharetools theme-classic sharetools-story-meta-footer " data-shares="facebook,twitter,email,show-all,save" data-url="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055oe_/http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/18/opinion/rare-chance-for-mercy-on-texas-death-row.html" data-title="Rare Chance for Mercy on Texas’ Death Row" data-author="By THE EDITORIAL BOARD" data-media="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-jumbo.jpg" data-description="An inmate faces execution under a law that blames accomplices as much as actual killers." data-publish-date="August 18, 2016"> <a class="visually-hidden skip-to-text-link" href="#story-continues-1">Continue reading the main story</a> <span class="sharetools-label visually-hidden">Share This Page</span> <div class="ad sharetools-inline-article-ad hidden nocontent robots-nocontent"> <a class="visually-hidden skip-to-text-link" href="#story-continues-1">Continue reading the main story</a> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </header> <div class="story-body-supplemental"> <div class="story-body story-body-1"> <figure id="media-100000004598505" class="media photo lede layout-large-horizontal" data-media-action="modal" itemprop="associatedMedia" itemscope itemid="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-master768.jpg" itemtype="http://schema.org/ImageObject" aria-label="media" role="group"> <span class="visually-hidden">Photo</span> <div class="image"> <img src="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055im_/https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-master768.jpg" alt="" class="media-viewer-candidate" data-mediaviewer-src="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-superJumbo.jpg" data-mediaviewer-caption="A rally to halt the execution of a death row inmate in Austin, Tex., in July." data-mediaviewer-credit="" itemprop="url" itemid="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2016/08/18/opinion/18thu3web/18thu3web-master768.jpg"/> <meta itemprop="height" content="513"/> <meta itemprop="width" content="768"/> </div> <figcaption class="caption" itemprop="caption description"> <span class="caption-text">A rally to halt the execution of a death row inmate in Austin, Tex., in July.</span> </figcaption> </figure> <p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="104" data-total-count="104">When it comes to capital punishment, there is not much official mercy to be found in the state of Texas.</p><p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="374" data-total-count="478">As <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/https://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_executed_offenders.html">537</a><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/https://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_executed_offenders.html"> death row inmates</a> were executed there over the last 40 years, only two inmates were granted clemency. The last commutation to life in prison occurred nine years ago, when Gov. Rick Perry, despite his formidable tally of 319 executions, chose to make an exception and spare a man convicted of murder under the state’s arcane and patently unfair “Law of Parties.”</p><p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="486" data-total-count="964">This law in effect holds that someone waiting outside at the wheel of a getaway car deserves the same capital punishment as his associate inside who shoots and kills a store clerk. This is the rough equation that now finds Jeffrey Wood <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/08/12/in-texas-a-man-who-didnt-kill-anybody-is-about-to-be-executed-for-murder/">on death row in Texas</a>, 20 years after his involvement in just such a crime. The actual killer was executed in 2002; Mr. Wood faces execution next Wednesday as a somehow equally culpable party, unless the state commutes his sentence to life in prison.</p><figure id="opinion-newsletter-promo" class="interactive interactive-embedded limit-small layout-small"> <figcaption class="interactive-caption"> </figcaption> <div class="interactive-graphic">   <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055cs_/http://graphics8.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2014/12/02/email-kirstof-embed/cbc36bdb86303cbcf8bdfea5a048ab3f44bf5ce1/build.css"> <div id="d-promo-realestate"> <h2 class="d-headline">Sign Up for the Opinion Today Newsletter</h2> <p class="d-leadin">Every weekday, get thought-provoking commentary from Op-Ed columnists, The Times editorial board and contributing writers from around the world.</p> <iframe height="45" title="regilite" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055if_/https://regilite.nytimes.com/regilite?product=TY&theme=Transparent&landing=true&addSlot=true&app=newsletter&sourceApp=nyt-v5&title=Opinion+Today" scrolling="no" allowtransparency="true"></iframe> </div>  <script> var NYTG_ASSETS = "https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://graphics8.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2014/12/02/email-kirstof-embed/cbc36bdb86303cbcf8bdfea5a048ab3f44bf5ce1/"; var NYTG_BIG_ASSETS = "https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://graphics8.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2014/12/02/email-kirstof-embed/assets/"; require(['foundation/main'], function() { // this file is generated from src/script.js require(["https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://graphics8.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2014/12/02/email-kirstof-embed/cbc36bdb86303cbcf8bdfea5a048ab3f44bf5ce1/build.js"]); }); </script> </div> <div class="footer"> </div> </figure> <p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="451" data-total-count="1415">The Law of Parties has been on trial as much as Mr. Wood has in the arduous criminal justice process in which he faces death. With an I.Q. of 80 and no criminal history, Mr. Wood, who was 22 then, was initially found by a jury to be incompetent to stand trial. But the state persisted, and he was convicted in a slipshod proceeding in which no mitigating evidence or cross-examination was attempted in his behalf during the crucial sentencing hearing.</p><p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="337" data-total-count="1752">Mr. Wood bizarrely demanded to represent himself, but was ruled incompetent as a counsel — yet not as a defendant. He maintained he was forced at gunpoint into being a robbery accomplice. As the case ground forward, a federal judge stayed the last scheduled execution date in 2008 because of Mr. Wood’s repeatedly eccentric behavior.</p><div id="story-ad-1" class="story-ad ad ad-placeholder nocontent robots-nocontent"> <div class="accessibility-ad-header visually-hidden"> <p>Advertisement</p> </div> <a class="visually-hidden skip-to-text-link" href="#story-continues-1">Continue reading the main story</a> </div> <p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="805" data-total-count="2557" id="story-continues-1">The theory underpinning the Law of Parties — that an accomplice deserves to die even though he did not kill the victim — has been abandoned as difficult to apply if not unjust in most state jurisdictions in recent decades. It holds that an accomplice should have anticipated the likelihood of a capital murder and deserves the ultimate penalty. Since the death penalty was restored in 1976, there have been only 10 executions in six states under accomplice culpability laws, in which defendants did not directly kill the victim, according to <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/man-deserve-die/"> Texas Monthly</a>. Five of them have been in Texas. Jared Tyler, Mr. Wood’s lawyer, who specializes in the state’s death row cases, says he has never seen a sentence of execution “in which there was no defense at all on the question of death worthiness.”</p><p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="285" data-total-count="2842">This is just one of many grounds for the clemency that four dozen evangelical leaders have recommended to avoid a gross injustice. The state parole board would have to make this recommendation, with the final decision by Gov. Greg Abbott, who has not granted clemency in 19 executions.</p><p class="story-body-text story-content" data-para-count="210" data-total-count="3052">The Law of Parties stands as a grotesque demonstration of how utterly arbitrary capital punishment is. The only true course for justice in Texas is for the law to be scrapped and Mr. Wood’s life to be spared.</p><footer class="story-footer story-content"> <div class="story-meta"> <div class="story-info"><p><em>Follow The New York Times Opinion section on <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/https://www.facebook.com/nytopinion">Facebook</a> and <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://twitter.com/NYTOpinion">Twitter</a> (@NYTOpinion), and sign up for the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20160819001055/http://www.nytimes.com/newsletters/opiniontoday/">Opinion Today newsletter</a>. <br/></em></p></div> <p class="story-print-citation">A version of this editorial appears in print on August 18, 2016, on page A22 of the <span itemprop="printEdition">New York edition</span> with the headline: Rare Chance for Mercy on Texas’ Death Row. <span class="story-footer-links"> <span><a 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Rare Chance for Mercy on Texas’ Death Row - The New York Times