AUSTIN -- Three ousted members of the Texas Forensic Science Commission said Thursday that their abrupt removal by Gov. Rick Perry this week could slow the panel's efforts to determine if a flawed arson investigation led to the execution of an innocent man five years ago.
But Perry said the commission's inquiry will continue, telling reporters that his decision to replace the three commission members was part of the normal appointments process. Their terms expired Sept. 1.
Perry removed Chairman Sam Bassett and commission members Alan Levy and Aliece Watts on Wednesday, two days before the obscure panel was scheduled to discuss a forensic report challenging the arson findings that that led to Cameron Todd Willingham’s execution in 2004.
Willingham, of Corsicana, was found guilty in the deaths of his three daughters in a 1991 fire. Willingham said that he was asleep in his house when the fire started and denied that he deliberately killed his daughters.
In telephone interviews, the commission members who got the boot said they were surprised and disappointed with Perry’s decision to replace them and expressed concern that the shake-up could disrupt or at least slow the pace of the panel’s inquiry. Levy is a top prosecutor in the Tarrant County district attorney’s office. Watts, who lives in Burleson, is a forensic scientist at Integrated Forensic Laboratories in Euless. Bassett is an Austin attorney.
The panel had been scheduled to meet today in Irving to hear expert Craig Beyler, who authored the report challenging the conclusions of the arson investigation. The meeting was canceled after the dismissals.
2 comments:
"Just what is it about Texas?"
Molly Ivins
Perry was following the playbook of Governor George W. Bush before him. He just had to prove to his half-witted constituency that he was "tough on crime". While he was governor, Bush was responsible for the executions on 150 men and women. He refused to even consider pardons of people of even questionable guilt or mental impairment.
As the great Lenny Bruce once said: "Thou shalt not kills means just that!"
Lenny was an agnostic and a Jew. And yet he had a deeper understanding of the tenets of Christianity than so-called "Christians" Bush and Perry.
http://www.tomdegan.blogspot.com
Tom Degan
Goshen, NY
The last minute move by Perry to replace the members of the Commission and then appoint an old crony as Chairman has a stench to it that permeates the air throughout the US from coast to coast.
The claim that the move Perry made was not politically motivated are an insult to people’s intelligence. If there was nothing to hide nor fear of what might be exposed by the Commission’s investigation regarding Willingham’s trial and execution, there would have been no need to deliberately remove members of the Commission and, thus, cause an indefinite delay in the Commission’s report of their findings.
It is imperative that it be known if Texas’ justice system with its execution of those who are found guilty of a death penalty crime is fallible. Further, Mr. Willingham’s family, the public and those who now sit on death row, who could possibly be innocent, have the right to know if Mr. Willingham was executed by the State of Texas a truly guilty man or if the State of Texas has the blood of an innocent man on its hands.
One must not forget the scandal surrounding the Houston Police Department Crime Lab and the scathing report that filled five volumes released by the Special Investigator and his task force.
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