Activists ask Governor Perry to grant 30-day reprieve for Johnny Martinez

May 22, 2002
Contact: Scott Cobb xxx-xxx-xxxx

Messages from around the country are pouring into Texas Governor Rick 
Perry’s office asking that he grant a 30-day reprieve for Johnny Martinez 
after an appeal for mercy form the mother of Mr. Martinez’s victim. A vigil 
will be held for Johnny Martinez this afternoon May 22 beginning at 5:30 PM 
at the Governor’s Mansion (11th & Lavaca).


At 6.00 PM tonight, Johnny Martinez is scheduled to be executed by the state 
of Texas for the murder of Clay Peterson. Lana Norris, the mother of the 
victim has asked that Johnny Martinez be granted clemency. The Texas Board 
of Pardons and Paroles denied this request by a vote of 9 to 8 this week.

Mrs. Norris (the victims mother) appeared on the Today Show today to share 
her message that “to execute him would be a ‘double crime against society’ 
because it would create another family who has lost a son.”

Texas Moratorium Network would like Governor Perry to ask the Texas Board of 
Pardons and Paroles to reconvene and reconsider a commutation in this case. 
We ask Gov. Perry to stop tonight’s execution by granting a 30-day reprieve 
so that the board can meet again and take into consideration the wishes of 
the victim’s mother to stop the execution.

Marisa Fehrenbach of Texas Moratorium Network wrote in a letter to Governor 
Perry, “The victim’s family must be heard. It is not fair nor moral for the 
state to support victims’ families who wish to execute while ignoring the 
wishes of a family that does not want their son’s killer executed.”

Fehrenbach continued, “Texas Moratorium Network asks that you grant Mr. 
Martinez a 30-day reprieve so that the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles 
can reconvene and reconsider a commutation in this case. We ask you to stop 
tonight’s execution so that the board can meet again and take into 
consideration the wishes of the victim’s mother to commute the sentence to 
life in prison. Please ask the BPP to hold a public hearing so that the 
victim’s family may speak to the entire board about its wishes.”

Condemned convict met with woman in mediation program

A confessed killer, Johnny Joe Martinez, is scheduled to die by injection next week. The mother of his victim is trying to stop it. 


In a rare move, she has sent a letter to the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, asking that Mr. Martinez’s death sentence be commuted to life.

“To execute Mr. Martinez would be a double crime against society,” wrote Lana Norris, whose plea came after an unusual face-to-face meeting with her son’s killer. 

Ms. Norris, who also asked to talk personally with each member of the 
board, says she believes in the death penalty. She and her 2nd husband, 
Thomas Dillon, now deceased, backed a law to allow victims’ families to 
witness executions in Texas’ death chamber. 

Her letter makes it clear how devastated she was by the vicious stabbing 
death of her son, Clay Peterson, “my precious baby boy,” as he worked an 
overnight convenience-store shift 9 years ago. 

“I have hurt more than I knew possible,” she wrote. “I no longer wanted 
to live and even counted the pills, considering suicide in those early 
days. While I never took the pills, I just wanted out of the pain.”

But, she added, she doesn’t want another mother the killer’s to go 
through the same agony. “Please, do not cause another mother to lose her 
son to murder, needlessly!” she wrote. 

Any impact of Ms. Norris’ letter won’t be known for several days. Gerald 
Garrett, chairman of the board of Pardons and Paroles, said he doesn’t 
know whether he will schedule a public hearing to consider the case; if 
not, members will vote by fax machine, as usual, on whether the sentence 
should be carried out. 

Ms. Norris declined to talk with The Dallas Morning News about the letter 
except to say that, “I’ve been blessed by an extraordinary God and as a 
result of that have probably been healed more than most victims.”

She said she prayed long and hard about the decision before writing the 
letter May 7. She wrote it 4 days after meeting with Mr. Martinez, 29, in 
a mediation program offered by the prison system. 

Mediation involving victims and offenders in Texas has been available 
since 1994 at the request of victims. Only a handful out of the roughly 
100 sessions held to date have involved death row inmates, said Edwardo 
Mendoza, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s mediation 
coordinator. 

Few victims’ families in death row cases have sought mediation, and some 
convicts have refused them, perhaps because their cases are still on 
appeal. 

Information stemming from mediation is confidential and not given to the 
parole board for consideration of cases. 

Ms. Norris asked for a mediation session even though Mr. Martinez had not 
responded to a previous letter. After both parties underwent extensive 
counseling to prepare for the session, they met in the chapel of the 
prison unit in Livingston that houses death row. 

****

Here are the contents of a letter Lana Norris wrote to state pardons 
officials, seeking clemency for her son’s killer:

Dear Sir:

It is my understanding that there is a petition on the commutation of the 
death sentence to a life sentence in this case. I would like to have this 
letter considered as part of your decision in this issue. If possible, I 
would also like the opportunity to talk with each of you personally, 
either by phone or in person. As Clay Peterson’s mother, I feel that I 
have been affected by this crime more than any other person, with the 
exception of my precious baby boy, Clay.

Clay was 20 years old at the time of this crime. Even in the turmoil that 
existed in the beginning, I knew that Clay was okay and had forgiven 
Johnny Joe Martinez (hereafter referred to as Mr. Martinez). Yet, I did 
not know if the death sentence was appropriate. I was not and never have 
been asked if the death sentence was what I wanted. While I know that 
this case is the State of Texas vs. Mr. Martinez, my desires should be 
considered. I realize that I was too close to the case and too 
emotionally distraught to be able to look at things objectively at the 
time of the trial.

For over 8 1/2 years, I have struggled with the knowledge that I was in 
some way connected to an inmate on death row. Many times, each day, I 
think of Clay, and always my thoughts turn to Mr. Martinez. I am not 
trying to minimize the hurt and struggle I have been through. I have hurt 
more than I knew possible. I have felt anger, regret and every possible 
emotion. For a time, I lost hope and was clinically depressed. I no 
longer wanted to live and even counted the pills, considering suicide in 
those early days. While I never took the pills, I just wanted out of the 
pain.

For 8 1/2 years, I have revisited the pain of that night many times. I 
have struggled with the pain of knowing that Clay would not want this 
execution. To some extent, having an inmate on death row has complicated 
my recovery process. For the last couple of months, I have struggled with 
this issue even more. While I do believe in the death penalty, with the 
date of execution drawing near, I have done much soul searching. When 
Clay was killed, his crime was more than a crime against me and his 
family. It was a crime against society.

Clay was a loving, caring, young man. He was active in Christian youth 
ministry and would have had a positive impact on many throughout his 
life. While Mr. Martinez had a different start in life, there was nothing 
before this incident that would have led anyone to believe this crime 
would happen. Last Friday, May 3, I had the opportunity to do mediation 
with Mr. Martinez. There is no doubt in my mind, that to execute Mr. 
Martinez would be a double crime against society. Here is a young man 
that has truly repented and regrets his actions of July 15, 1993. If his 
sentence is commuted to a life sentence, he will be 54 before his 1st 
possible chance of parole. During that time, he could be a positive 
influence on other inmates that he comes in contact with. He may be able 
to help them understand how to change their life and direction for the 
better.

Please, do not cause another mother to lose her son to murder, needlessly!

In His Love,

Lana K. Norris 



The murder victim’s father issued this statement to the public:


My son, Clay Peterson, was a Christian who witnessed to many people in 
the South Texas area in his short life. I do not believe that he would 
have demanded the Old Testament punishment of an eye for an eye, but 
instead would have followed the teachings of Christ to forgive not 7 
times, but 70 times seven. I can do no less.

Society must protect itself from those who do not value the lives and 
property of others. However, I doubt that Johnny Martinez would be a 
threat to society by the time he would be eligible for parole if his 
sentence were commuted to life.

Paul B. Peterson 

*****

The session lasted about 4 hours, said Mr. Martinez’s defense attorney, 
David Dow, who witnessed the meeting. He described it as an extraordinary 
event that began with Ms. Norris holding Mr. Martinez’s shackled hands in 
prayer. 

‘I killed her only son’ 

Mr. Dow said his client was nervous before the session. 

“I killed her only son,” he told Mr. Dow as he waited for the session to 
begin. 

The killing occurred July 15, 1993. After a night of drinking, Mr. 
Martinez, then 20, robbed a Corpus Christi convenience store. Mr. 
Peterson, a college student who had celebrated his 20th birthday the day 
before, was stabbed 8 times in the neck, back and shoulders. The brutal 
killing was caught on videotape by a store surveillance camera. 

About 15 minutes after the stabbing, Mr. Martinez called 911 from a 
nearby motel, told the police dispatcher what he had done and said he 
would wait for authorities to arrive. He surrendered without resistance, 
expressed remorse and later confessed. 

During mediation, Ms. Norris told Mr. Martinez she wanted answers about 
what happened that day. The answer was similar to what he said at trial 
nine years ago: “I don’t know why. That’s a question I will never be able 
to answer.” 

Mr. Dow said there was no anger in the mediation session. “I don’t think 
there were any raised voices.” 

There were tears and occasional smiles. 

About halfway through the session, Mr. Dow said, Ms. Norris told Mr. 
Martinez that she believed in the death penalty but added, “I don’t think 
it’s right for you.” 

At that point, Mr. Martinez asked whether she would write a letter on his 
behalf. Ms. Norris said she would think about it; she called Clay’s 
father, Paul Peterson, who lives in the Dallas area, before sending the 
letter a few days later. 

Mr. Peterson, who is divorced from Ms. Norris, said he understood why she 
wrote the letter. Though he, too, supports the death penalty, he said he 
doesn’t object to a commutation for Mr. Martinez. 

’70 times 7′ 

His son discussed his Christian beliefs with many people and “would have 
followed the teachings of Christ to forgive not seven times but seventy 
times seven,” Mr. Peterson said. “I can do no less.” 

He said he had no desire to go through mediation with Mr. Martinez, but 
after talking with Ms. Norris, “I doubt that Johnny Martinez would be a 
threat to society by the time he would be eligible for parole if his 
sentence were commuted to life.” 

Mr. Dow said he is considering some last-minute legal maneuvers in the 
case, but Mr. Martinez’s fate now rests largely with the Texas Board of 
Pardons and Paroles. The 18-member board is expected to vote this week on 
Mr. Martinez’s case. 

Chairman Gerald Garrett said a letter asking for clemency from a relative 
of the victim is “out of the norm.” Because Ms. Norris was among those 
most directly affected by the crime, it would have more impact than most 
letters received by the board. 

“Here is a young man that has truly repented and regrets his actions of 
July 15, 1993,” she wrote. “If his sentence is commuted to a life 
sentence, he will be 54 before his 1st possible chance of parole. During 
that time, he could be a positive influence on other inmates that he 
comes in contact with.” 

No hint of violence 

Mr. Martinez is different from most death row inmates, said Mr. Dow, 
because he “had absolutely no markers in his own personal history that 
would have suggested that he was going to stab somebody to death one day. He had no prior convictions; in fact he had no prior history of violence.” 

Mr. Dow says his client, a high school dropout, was abused as a youngster and left home at age 14. 

To receive the death penalty in Texas, an offender must be shown to pose a future danger to society. Nueces County District Attorney Carlos Valdez said he knew Mr. Martinez had no history of criminal behavior but the brutality of the crime was enough to seek the death penalty. 

“We thought the offense itself, which was captured on videotape, showed the viciousness of the case and the case called for the death penalty,” Mr. Valdez said. 

Mr. Valdez said he consulted with family members before seeking the death penalty; Ms. Norris and Mr. Peterson say they were not asked. 

Clemency from the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, which must be approved by the governor, is rare. 

“I was appointed in 1995,” Mr. Garrett said, “And during my tenure, Mr. [Henry Lee] Lucas is the only person that has received a commutation recommendation.” 

Mr. Lucas, who confessed to being a serial killer, had his death sentence commuted to life in 1998, because of doubts about his truthfulness. 

District Attorney Valdez said he didn’t know if Ms. Norris’ plea would sway the parole board to commute Mr. Martinez’s sentence, but he didn’t think it should. “If anybody’s thinking about changing their mind, I suggest they watch the video of the killing,” he said. 

5/19/2002

It’s been busy in Huntsville. This year, Texas already has executed 12 men 
at its prison facility there. And the state is scheduled to execute another 
five in the next several weeks. Texas is unchallenged as the leader in 
cumulative executions since 1982, with more than 265 people being put to 
death here. It’s not a statistic that should make Texans proud.

http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/stories/051902dnedideathpenalty.bbb9b.html

The people executed and awaiting execution were convicted of committing 
terrible crimes – actions unthinkable to most people. The public watching 
the recent trials, like those for the murder of the Battaglia children or of 
Aubrey Hawkins, may find little room for compassion. But, and there’s always 
a but, questions in other cases surface, questions that trouble ethical 
people about the use of the death penalty – especially in Texas.

State legislators last year attempted to resolve one of the state’s most 
egregious wrongs: incompetent counsel. The newly formed Task Force on 
Indigent Defense oversees standards for counties’ defense appointments. 
However, that won’t help the approximate 450 current death row inmates who 
may have been victims of Texas’ infamous too-often-incompetent appointed 
lawyers. And with the Court of Criminal Appeals deciding recently that 
Texans have “no constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel” in 
part of the appeals process, the poor on death row may have little recourse 
to justice.

Other questions also persist about access to a fair trial. The Illinois 
Commission on Capital Punishment studied the death penalty process for two 
years and recently issued its report with more than 80 recommendations. The 
commission members included judges, prosecutors and defense lawyers. Its 
recommendations for improved justice can apply to most criminal proceedings.

Texans should take heed.

As Greg Wiercioch of the Texas Defender Service says, “These issues are not 
only relevant to Illinois because it borders on the Great Lakes. If 
anything, Texas epitomizes the issues such as eyewitness identification, 
prosecutorial misconduct, elected judges and racism.”

Hanna Liebman Dershowitz, the legal director of Texas Appleseed, says some 
of the proposed Illinois safeguards would be easy to implement. They include 
videotaping interrogations and allowing eyewitnesses to view possible 
suspects in sequence rather than in a lineup.

Also, some basic ethical considerations raised in the study still challenge 
Texas, such as executing the mentally retarded.

Texas juries may be becoming more sophisticated in their understanding of 
mental illness, but they don’t understand retardation, which is a basic 
impairment of intellectual functioning. Retarded Texas death row inmate John 
Paul Penry now is getting his third sentencing hearing because the Supreme 
Court determined that earlier juries were never properly instructed – new 
jury selection and the sentencing process is expected to take months. This 
case may be overridden by a ruling from the Supreme Court on whether 
executing the retarded should be outlawed as cruel and unusual punishment. 
Many hope the court also provides guidelines for defining retardation. One 
Texas lawyer notes his mentally retarded client is scheduled for execution 
in early June. Even if the Supreme Court doesn’t rule out the death penalty 
for retarded people, this state should.

Texas justice is fearsome. But it should be fair. That’s why the Legislature 
should use this time between sessions to review the work of the Illinois 
commission ( www100.state.il.us). It also should consider whether the death 
penalty in Texas suffers from racial bias, the issue that prompted the 
Maryland governor to place a moratorium on executions this month. And it 
needs to be clear on the financial cost of the death penalty.

The Senate Jurisprudence Committee, chaired by Dallas Sen. Royce West, 
and/or the House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee, chaired by McAllen Rep. 
Juan Hinojosa, should take on the task. Other elected officials, like the 
attorney general, should review recent reports and reconsider Texas 
practices.

Texans must have a clearer conscience about the people it puts behind bars 
or to death, especially given the rate of executions in this state.

As courts consider death penalty questions, other states stopping

05/19/2002

By ED TIMMS / The Dallas Morning News

Texas’ bigger-than-life ethos is sometimes more brag than fact, but one 
distinction is apparent: No other state has executed more inmates this year.

http://www.dallasnews.com/texassouthwest/stories/051902dntexdeathpenalty.65473.html

So far, 28 offenders have been put to death nationwide, 12 in Texas. And 
Texas accounts for all but two of the 15 executions scheduled in the United 
States through mid-September.

Because of legal complications and angst over how the death penalty is 
administered, several other states that until recently executed offenders 
have stopped – at least for the present.

Several factors contribute to Texas’ sobering record.

Those include a political climate in which the penalty is not a liability, 
as well as state and federal appeals courts that are not hostile to the 
death penalty.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry repeatedly has voiced his support for the death 
penalty, vetoed a bill last year that would have barred the execution of 
mentally retarded offenders and opposes a moratorium on executions.

Such sentiments are not uncommon among political leaders in the states where 
most executions are carried out.

“You have a lot of states outside the South with very large death row 
populations and no executions,” said University of Texas law professor 
Jordan Steiker, an authority on capital punishment who once served as a law 
clerk law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. “Outside the 
South and the border states, there simply hasn’t been the same political 
will.”

Some critics claim that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state’s 
highest criminal court, repeatedly has turned a blind eye to serious 
shortcomings in how capital cases are tried. Similar charges are leveled 
against the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which also reviews Texas 
death penalty cases.

“We have a politicized, partisan judicial system,” said Steve Hall, director 
of the StandDown Texas Project, which is seeking a death penalty moratorium.

Juries continue


But even as national and international attention focuses on the Lone Star 
State because of the death penalty, and legal challenges continue, juries in 
Texas, which decide punishment in capital cases, continue to sentence 
defendants to die.
“If people in Texas are really, by and large, disgusted with the fact that 
we have a death penalty, I think you would see far fewer death penalty cases 
handed out,” said Diane Beckham, staff counsel for the Texas District and 
County Attorneys Association.

She said she sees little evidence that Texas legislators are being 
encouraged by their constituents to oppose the death penalty.

Texans who oppose the death penalty, or seek a moratorium so that its 
application can be reviewed, assert that the system under which defendants 
are convicted for capital crimes and sent to death row is profoundly flawed. 
And they suggest that Texans are increasingly concerned about how the death 
penalty is applied.

“No other state carries out executions at such a relentless pace as Texas,” 
said Mr. Hall. “This headlong dash occurs in spite of many controversies 
over police and prosecutorial misconduct, inadequate standards of legal 
representation, dubious testimony by so-called experts, an appeals court 
that puts a seal of approval on sleeping lawyers, and a clemency process 
that simply does not fulfill its historic responsibility.”

What some have described as isolated incidents, Mr. Hall said, represent 
systemic problems.

Roe Wilson, chief of post-conviction writs for the Harris County district 
attorney’s office, said that Texas’ death penalty statute has been examined 
repeatedly by higher courts and has withstood the scrutiny.

“Anyone who is executing the death penalty, putting it into place and 
carrying it through like we do in Texas … then you’ve got a vested 
interest in doing it the right way and making sure that the law is as tight 
and well-defined as you possibly can,” Ms. Wilson said.

Litigation avoided


Mr. Steiker said that by defining what qualifies as a capital murder 
narrowly at the guilt-innocence stage of trial, Texas has avoided much of 
the litigation in other states, as has having juries sentence the defendants 
in capital cases. Still, some Texas executions have been held up, as courts 
consider the merits of appeals. Whether that’s part of a cycle, is a fluke, 
or reflects a broader hesitation about the death penalty, is open to 
speculation.
Last-minute reprieves this month postponed the executions of two Texas death 
row inmates, Curtis Lee Moore and Brian Edward Davis, after the U.S. Supreme 
Court received petitions alleging that they were mentally retarded.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals intervened and delayed the execution 
of Smith County death row inmate Henry Dunn last week; in that case, 
questions were raised about the competence of Mr. Dunn’s appellate counsel.

And in February, the Supreme Court also agreed to hear the case of Thomas 
Miller-El, who was sentenced to death in 1986 for the murder of an Irving 
hotel clerk during a robbery. Mr. Miller-El’s attorneys claimed that 
potential jurors were excluded from his trial because of their race.

Supreme Court cases


Two cases before the Supreme Court, neither from Texas, could have a 
significant impact on the death penalty in America.
One case, Atkins vs. Virginia, resulted in reprieves for Mr. Moore and Mr. 
Davis. It examines whether executing mentally retarded offenders is cruel 
and unusual punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment of the 
U.S. Constitution. The court is expected to rule in the Atkins case this 
summer.

More than a decade ago, the Supreme Court overturned the conviction of Texas 
death row inmate Johnny Paul Penry, ruling that instructions to his jury did 
not allow proper consideration of mitigating evidence, such as his mental 
retardation. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote in the majority opinion that, 
at that time, there was not sufficient evidence of a “national consensus 
against executing the retarded.”

Mr. Penry was convicted in a subsequent trial, but his death sentence was 
overturned by the Supreme Court last year. A new punishment hearing is under 
way.

Mr. Steiker theorized that if the Supreme Court decides in the Atkins case 
“that there is now an emerging, prevailing consensus against executing 
people with mental retardation,” that would suggest that the way the court 
gauges “societal consensus” is shifting.

Such a shift, he said, could have ramifications for other death row inmates. 
For example, he said, the Supreme Court justices might find that executing 
offenders who were under the age of 18 at the time of the offense is 
unconstitutional, or they might revisit the issue of executing offenders who 
were not directly responsible for a capital murder, so-called 
“non-triggermen.”

‘Up to the states’


Richard Dieter, executive director of the nonprofit Death Penalty 
Information Center, said that if the Supreme Court decides to bar the 
execution of the mentally retarded, the justices “may not lay down neatly 
what mental retardation is, and leave it up to the states and courts to 
figure this out.”
And that, he said, is likely to set off considerable debate and legal 
wrangling.

Harris County prosecutors, for example, assert that Mr. Davis, convicted for 
the 1991 stabbing death of Michael Alan Foster in Humble, is not mentally 
retarded – and that claim was first raised in legal petitions on the day he 
was to be executed.

His attorneys point to Mr. Davis’ long history of difficulties in coping 
with day-to-day life, placement in special education classes while in 
school, and a test that placed his IQ at 74 – four points above 70, one 
benchmark for retardation, but within the margin of error.

The Supreme Court also could decide that the execution of the mentally 
retarded does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment. If that occurs, 
inmates who were granted reprieves because of Atkins could be facing 
execution again in the near future.

Sentencing by judge


In the second case, Ring vs. Arizona, Supreme Court justices will examine 
the constitutionality of death sentences being handed down by a judge rather 
than a jury.
The case does not directly affect cases in Texas, where juries in capital 
cases decide punishment. But the Ring case has contributed to Texas’ 
dominance of death row statistics in 2002: Pending a ruling by the Supreme 
Court, several states in which judges assess the death penalty are not 
executing offenders.

Ms. Wilson, the Harris County prosecutor, predicts that frequency of 
executions in Texas will increase.

Death penalty reforms in 1995, she said, which restructured the appeals 
process, resulted in “a tremendous number of cases in the federal system.”

“We had a huge glut of cases that arrived … about the same time,” she 
said. “And now they’re starting to come out.”

Here is an example letter we sent to the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles regarding Napolean Beazley. Feel free to use this as a template for your own letters.

May 16, 2002

Chairman Gerald Garrett
Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles
P.O. Box 13401, Capitol Station
Austin, Texas 78711

RE: Clemency for Napoleon Beazley

Dear Chairman Garrett:

I am writing on behalf of Texas Moratorium Network to appeal for clemency 
for Napoleon Beazley on two major grounds – his status as a juvenile 
offender at the time of his offense and the racial aspects of the case. We 
would like you to recommend to Governor Perry that he commute Napoleon’s 
sentence to life in prison.

Napoleon was only 17 years old at the time of his crime. There is a growing 
consensus in Texas that we should stop executing people who commit crimes 
under the age of 18. In 2001, the Texas House of Representatives passed a 
bill that would have banned executions of juvenile offenders. The bill did 
not reach the Senate in time for it to be considered before the session 
expired. In 2003, the bill will be filed again and in light of growing 
opposition among Texas voters to executing juvenile offenders, and the fact 
that by continuing to execute juvenile offenders the United States stands 
virtually alone in the world community, the bill will probably pass next 
time. Please do not allow Napoleon to be one of the last juvenile offenders 
to be executed before the Texas Legislature bans the practice.

Texas Moratorium Network is also concerned about the racial aspects of this 
case. Napoleon is an African-American who was sentenced to death by an 
all-white jury for the murder of a white person. Potential black jurors were 
systematically kept off Napoleon’s jury. Maryland recently enacted a 
moratorium on executions in order to complete a study on the issue of race 
and the death penalty. Texas also needs to stop executions in cases where 
race has played an important factor in determining whether a defendant 
receives the death penalty. We need to make sure that defendants are judged 
by the relevant facts of their cases and not by the color of their skin.

Texas Moratorium Network, an organization with a growing support base of 
more than 6,000 people across the state of Texas, is working to establish a 
moratorium on executions, so that a Texas Capital Punishment Commission can 
conduct a comprehensive study of the death penalty system in our state.

Thank you for your consideration,

Sincerely,

Scott Cobb
Texas Moratorium Network