John Paul Penry

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June 12, 2006, 11:55AM
Texas loses appeal in Penry death row case


By GINA HOLLAND
Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court refused today to reinstate the death sentence of Johnny Paul Penry, a Texas inmate who has twice won reprieves from the justices.

Penry has been one of the most high-profile death row cases at the high court over the past two decades, stirring national debate over whether mentally retarded inmates should be executed.

www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3962118.html

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4th jury may decide killer's punishment

By MICHAEL GRACZYK
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Jun. 13, 2006

PAUL PENRYHOUSTON -- One of the longest and most contentious death penalty cases in Texas is heading back for yet another trial.

The U.S. Supreme Court, acting Monday on an appeal from the Texas attorney general's office, declined to reinstate the death sentence of Johnny Paul Penry, clearing the way for another jury to consider punishment for a fourth time. Penry was convicted of raping and fatally stabbing a woman at her Livingston home in 1979.

Penry turned 50 last month and has spent more than half of his life on Death Row for killing 22-year-old Pamela Moseley Carpenter. He confessed to attacking her and stabbing her with scissors, but his attorneys have said Penry, who says he believes in Santa Claus, has the reasoning capacity of a 7-year-old.

While psychological tests have put Penry's IQ between 50 and 60, at least five juries have found Penry legally competent to stand trial or have rejected defenses based on mental retardation. The high court in 2002 ruled that mentally retarded people, generally considered to be those with an IQ below 70, may not be executed.

In a 5-4 ruling in October, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals sent Penry's death sentence back for another punishment hearing, citing what judges called improper instructions that prevented jurors from considering the full scope of Penry's retardation claims. The attorney general's office appealed that decision to the high court.

"That's good news for us," said John Wright of Huntsville, one of Penry's lawyers since the beginning of his case. "We're looking at another trial -- if we can't settle it. And I would think by now we could."

William Lee Hon, a Polk County assistant prosecutor who has been handling the case for more than two decades, said: "There have been so many disappointments in regard to this case, you kind of become conditioned to adversity. So you take these blows as they come, and you do the best you can."

Hon said that he expects that Penry's lawyers will suggest an agreement to a sentence less than death to avoid another trial but that there are "a whole lot of considerations to look at" before deciding for a fourth time to seek a death sentence.

He also said the relatives of the victim, whose brother is former Washington Redskins kicker Mark Moseley, will be consulted.

Penry was on parole about three months after serving two years of a five-year rape conviction when he was arrested in the attack on Carpenter, who lived long enough to identify him as her assailant.

He was arrested later that day and has been in custody since.

He's among the longest-serving of the 399 inmates on Texas' Death Row.