In a post on the Texas Moratorium Network blog on October 3, 2007, we said “Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Presiding Judge Sharon Keller should resign or be impeached and removed from office for her conduct regarding the execution of Michael Richard. As long as Keller is in office, the people of Texas can not be sure that justice is being done with integrity”.
We filed a complaint against Keller (pdf) with the State Commission on Judicial Conduct that was signed by about 1900 people. We delivered a copy of the complaint to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (video). We held a protest in front of her house (video). We revised our complaint to the Commission by sending them a copy of the Execution Day Procedures, which we obtained from Keller through a Public Information Request. She had first sent that document to R.G. Ratcliffe of the Houston Chronicle, but we requested she send us a copy so we could send it to the Commission. We went to the Legislature to ask legislators to sign on to a complaint or to file their own. State Rep Dutton, Olivo, Farrar and Coleman all signed one of the complaints or filed their own. We went back to the Legislature in December 2008 to ask Lon Burmam to file an impeachment resolution.
Now, the State Commission has officially charged Keller with misconduct that “casts public discredit on the judiciary or the administration of justice” and with “incompetence in the performance of duties of office.”
We expect that over the next week or so, there will be several editorials by Texas newspapers joining our call for Keller to resign.
How long before Keller is forced out by resignation, impeachment or removal by the process set forth in the Notice of Formal Proceedings by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct? The sooner, the better.
