Sharon Keller

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Sharon Keller (born in Dallas, Texas, 1953) is the Presiding Judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which is the highest court for all criminal matters in the State of Texas.

Keller graduated from Rice University in 1975. She received her J.D. from Southern Methodist University in 1978. She was elected the first woman judge on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in 1994. In 2000, she was elected presiding judge and re-elected in 2006. She is chairman of the Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense. She serves on the Executive Board of the Capitol Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

[edit] The "We close at 5" Controversy

On Sep. 25, 2007, Keller refused a condemned man's plea for a 20-minute extension to submit an appeal beyond the court's usual 5 p.m. closing time.[1] The man, Michael Richard, was executed later that night, despite indications that he had a strong basis for appeal. The U.S. Supreme Court had earlier that day accepted for consideration a case known as Baze v. Rees from Kentucky in which two death row inmates were challenging the constitutionality of lethal injection as a method of execution. Keller made the decision not to accept the late appeal without consulting the duty judge or any of the other judges on the court. Several judicial complaints were filed against Keller with the State Commission on Judicial Conduct. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals subsequently changed its rules to allow for late submissions in death penalty cases and other emergency situations. On April 16, 2008, the Supreme Court rejected the challenge in the Baze case, upholding Kentucky's method of execution.

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ Judge: 'We Close at 5' (HTML). ABC. American Broadcasting Corporation (2007). Retrieved on 2007-11-10.