TX inmate who ate his own eye loses court challenge

[peejay 327]

Condemned inmate who ate his own eye loses court challenge

By MICHAEL GRACZYK The Associated Press

March 18, 2009, 1:34PM

HOUSTON — A condemned Texas inmate with a history of mental problems who removed his only eye and ate it in a bizarre outburst several months ago on death row lost an appeal Wednesday at the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

Andre Thomas, who turned 26 Tuesday, raised 44 claims in his petition to the state’s highest criminal court, challenging his conviction and death sentence for the slaying of his estranged wife’s 13-month-old daughter five years ago in Grayson County in North Texas.

His wife and their 4-year-old son were murdered in the same attack. The victims were stabbed and had their hearts ripped out.

Thomas “is clearly ‘crazy,’ but he is also ‘sane’ under Texas law,” Judge Cathy Cochran wrote in a 14-page statement accompanying the court’s brief order upholding Thomas’ conviction and punishment.

Among claims in the appeal, Thomas’ attorneys argued instructions to his trial jury were incorrect regarding the law on voluntary intoxication, that the instruction should not have been given because it suggested his drug and alcohol use and not insanity were responsible for his actions, and that his trial attorneys were ineffective because they should have known the instructions were improper.

At Thomas’ trial in Sherman in 2005, defense lawyers said the killings were the result of insane delusions caused solely by Thomas’ mental disease. Prosecutors argued his psychosis was caused or aggravated by his voluntary use of alcohol, drugs and prescription drugs.

“There was ample evidence to reject an insanity defense and support a jury finding that (Thomas) knew that his conduct was wrong at the time he murdered his wife and the children,” Cochran wrote. “There was also evidence that (Thomas) did not know his conduct was wrong at the time. This was a quintessential fact issue for the jury to decide, and it did so.”

Jurors agreed with prosecutors.

“Although reasonable people might well differ on the questions of whether (Thomas) was sane at the time he committed these murders or competent at the time he was tried, those issues were appropriately addressed by the defense, the prosecution, trial judge, and the jury during the trial,” Cochran said.

While in the Grayson County Jail five days after his arrest, Thomas plucked out his right eye. A judge subsequently ruled he was competent to stand trial.

Last December, a death row officer at the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice found Thomas in his cell with blood on his face and had him taken to the unit infirmary. Thomas told officials he had pulled out his remaining eye and ate it.

He was taken to a hospital for treatment, then was transferred to a prison psychiatric unit.

There was no reference to the second eye removal in the court opinion.

Thomas was convicted of killing 13-month-old Leyha Marie Hughes. Also slain March 27, 2004, were his wife, Laura Christine Boren, 20, and their son, 4-year-old Andre Lee.

Thomas, from Texoma, walked into the Sherman Police Department and told a dispatcher he had murdered the three, then told officers he put his victims’ hearts in his pocket, left their apartment, took them home, put the organs in a plastic bag and threw them in the trash. He said God had told him to commit the killings.

“This is an extraordinarily tragic case,” Cochran wrote, saying the deaths could have been avoided because he twice went to hospitals for help but left voluntarily and couldn’t be held without legal authority.

The appeals court Wednesday also turned down appeals from two other condemned prisoners, Christopher Coleman and Clifton Lamar Williams.

Coleman, 37, was convicted of the December 1995 shooting deaths of three people in Houston, including a 3-year-old boy, in what was supposed to be a fake robbery scheme involving a Colombian cocaine peddler.

Williams, 25, was convicted of the July 2005 beating, stabbing and strangling of 93-year-old Cecelia Schneider at her home in Tyler. Evidence showed he set her body on fire, then fled with the woman’s purse, which contained $40, and her car.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/6319134.html

[one...two...tree 2,762]

“This is an extraordinarily tragic case,” Cochran wrote, saying the deaths could have been avoided because he twice went to hospitals for help but left voluntarily and couldn’t be held without legal authority.

I agree with that. Hospitals should be given the authority to contain someone they believe is a danger to themselves and others until someone appointed by the courts can determine if they are sane enough to leave.

[Peikko 1,575]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

[peejay 327]

“This is an extraordinarily tragic case,” Cochran wrote, saying the deaths could have been avoided because he twice went to hospitals for help but left voluntarily and couldn’t be held without legal authority.

I agree with that. Hospitals should be given the authority to contain someone they believe is a danger to themselves and others until someone appointed by the courts can determine if they are sane enough to leave.

These people have rights. They may be insane, but they have the right to refuse treatment. It is a revolving door. Cops arrest naked people smeared in their own feces and they are back out on the street in less than a week unsupervised.

But in any case, the state of TX is one of the worst when it comes to funding mental health care. At least, until it become a criminal matter.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

[john & jean 37]

GREAT, now that is out of the way we can get this sicko off of death row. I will pay for the electricity bill.....

Edited March 18, 2009 by john & jean

[Ban Hammer 13,407]

on the bright side, at least he won't see it coming.

[HannahP 119]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

Because we simply don't have them in this country?

[HannahP 119]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

Because we simply don't have them in this country?

The US is unlikely to go back to long-term institutionalization. I doubt he'd survive long in a general prison population. What else is there to do with him?

[~Jess~ 0]

on the bright side, at least he won't see it coming.

Now theres a point

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

Because we simply don't have them in this country?

The US is unlikely to go back to long-term institutionalization. I doubt he'd survive long in a general prison population. What else is there to do with him?

That's depressing.

[Peikko 1,575]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

Because we simply don't have them in this country?

I am not sure how we can be the judge of whether he is better off dead or not, not a call I would like to make. As for whether or not there are proper facilities to house such people, is that a good reason to execute someone, because we don't have the proper facilities for them? I don't envy the role of the executioner in any sense, but less so if we execute because we don't know what else to do with people. We don't know what to do with poor people either, perhaps we should execute them?

Edited March 18, 2009 by Madame Cleo

[peejay 327]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

I know a lot of people I would consider a bit crazy or at a minimum a bit eccentric. Are they insane? People kill other people for seemingly trivial reasons all the time. Are they insane? Or just crazy mofos?

Personally I don't care one way or another whether this guy is executed or stays locked up into eternity. He obviously did the dirty deeds he was convicted of. However, if he is executed he can never kill again.

And even though it is irrelevant to the case...this guy's life is fvcked at this point. What kind of a future does this guy have? What kind of quality of life? They would be putting this guy out of his misery.

[john & jean 37]

I was reading an essay recently about the death penalty and how the proportion of prisoners actually put to death, even sentenced to death doesn't really correlate in any meaningful way to the actual numbers of people who commit heinous crimes. There is obviously some kind of agenda at work, likely political, which makes the use of capital punishment even more dubious than I already thought it was. Tragic really. Too many people seem to get emotionally wound up in cases that are irrelevant to themselves. That would be ok if they even bothered to get enough information on a case to develop an informed opinion, but it's simply the same old 'kill the #######' rhetoric. Oh well.

Yep. Here's a man who even the judge says is clearly crazy, and yet he's still on Death Row. Sad.

But there also aren't really any facilities to keep people like him. De-institutionalization, etc. Sad thing is he probably is better off dead.

Because we simply don't have them in this country?

The US is unlikely to go back to long-term institutionalization. I doubt he'd survive long in a general prison population. What else is there to do with him?

we could always give him a job at STEEN HALL EYE INSTITUTE as an need an eyeball remover!!!