'Killer Keller' Rebuked Over Death-row Plea

A Texas judge faced a widespread rebuke from lawyers yesterday for refusing to keep her courthouse open after 5pm to hear a last-minute death-row appeal. The prisoner was executed hours later.

In an extraordinary protest, the National Association of Criminal defense Lawyers filed an official complaint against Sharon Keller, the presiding judge on the Texas court of criminal appeals, who is nicknamed "Killer Keller" for her tough stance. Several Texas judges joined the protest, and more than 300 lawyers in Texas have demanded the courts accept appeals filed electronically to prevent similar action in the future.

The uproar against Judge Keller followed her refusal late last month to wait 20 minutes to receive an appeal on behalf of Michael Richard, who had been condemned for the rape and murder of a mother of seven. Richard was scheduled for execution later that night.

His lawyers had suffered a computer breakdown and said they were unable to file the appeal within regular working hours. They had begged Judge Keller for more time and she refused.

Her decision might have gone unnoticed had the supreme court not announced, on September 25, that it was reviewing a challenge to the legality of lethal injection.

The announcement set off a flurry of appeals from death-row inmates and it is believed Richard's execution most likely would have been halted, to await the supreme court decision, had he been granted a hearing. Two days after Richard was executed, the supreme court blocked a lethal injection in Texas. Judges in Alabama and Kentucky have also stayed executions, bringing in an unofficial moratorium on the death penalty.

"This execution proceeded because the highest criminal court couldn't be bothered to stay an extra 20 minutes on the night of an execution," Andrea Keilen, of Texas Defender Service, told reporters.

But Judge Keller told the Houston Chronicle: "The question ought to be: why didn't they file something on time? They had all day."