Contact House Committee Members and Urge Them to Vote for HB 319 to End the Death Penalty Under the Law of Parties

We had a successful hearing today on HB 319, the bill to prohibit the death penalty under the law of parties. One of the people testifying was Terri Been, the sister of Jeff Wood, who is on Texas death row sentenced to death under the Law of Parties even though he did not kill anyone. Terri took the day off from work today and spent all day waiting to testify. She did a great job testifying. Thank you Terri! You can watch a video of the testimony on the Texas House site on Criminal Jurisprudence Committee April 9, 2013. The testimony on HB 319 starts around hour 5:58 and ends about 25 minutes later.

There were many, many names read of people who signed in in support of HB 319, it sounded like more people signed in in favor of this bill than many or all of the other bills heard today in this committee.

There was a lot of interest from the committee members judging from the questions they had. They seemed to have understood better this time than in previous years the distinction in the proposal having to do with the different sections of the current law of parties statute. A lot of the reason the committee members seemed to be better informed on the proposal was because of the work everyone did on the Lobby Day Against the Death Penalty back in March, when many people went to the offices of the committee members and talked to them about the Law of Parties.

Now, we have to get everyone to contact the committee members and urge them to vote the bill out of committee.

Contact the members of the Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence and urge them to vote in favor of HB 319.