On Monday, it seemed Roma Khanna had let Jeff Cohen down.
In that installment of the Chron Eye for the Death Row Killer Guy, Khanna departed slightly from the Chron Eye formula, neglecting to mention redeeming prison activities of the death row killer (like poetry or knitting) and also neglecting any reference to HPD or the crime lab, while actually devoting column space to the victim.
However, Khanna rebounded strongly today (the death row killer guy is scheduled to be executed tonight), as lawyers brought out the kitchen sink in an effort to save the death row killer guy:
An attorney representing a Houston man scheduled to be executed today argued Tuesday his life should be spared because of problems with the police work and prosecution in the case.
Anthony Guy Fuentes, 30, is scheduled to receive a lethal injection this evening for the shooting death of Robert Pres-ton Tate, 28, after a robbery of a convenience store on Feb. 18, 1994. Fuentes admits he participated in the robbery but maintains he did not kill Tate.
An appeal filed Monday notes discrepancies in the testimony of eyewitnesses and argues that Houston police officers improperly questioned witnesses. Defense attorneys also argued that Harris County prosecutors knowingly allowed a witness to give false testimony and withheld information that would have allowed defense attorneys to expose inconsistencies.
“You have all of these witnesses who witness the same event, and they are all seeing different things — some of them are dramatically different,” said Jim Marcus, executive director of the Texas Defender Service and one of Fuentes’ lawyers. “There are so many problems with the eyewitness testimony, and the case really hangs on putting the right gun in Fuentes’ hands.”
Chronicle editor Jeff Cohen’s wife, Kathryn Kase, is a prominent member of the Texas Defender Service.
Maybe that explains the journalistic resources devoted to the Chron Eye for the Death Row Killer Guy, even as entire sections are dropped and staff is laid off.
(Update) Anne Linehan calls my attention to the fact that the Texas Defender Service’s website links to a recent Chronicle series, A Deadly Distinction, on Harris County as the “pipeline to death row” in Texas. How convenient!
(Update 2) This particular Death Row Killer Guy is no longer with us.
