Supreme Court Blocks Execution of Texas Man While He Seeks DNA Testing

The Supreme Court on Tuesday temporarily blocked Texas from executing a man convicted of stabbing a retired teacher as he tried to obtain DNA tests that he said would remove him from death row.

Ruben Gutierrez, 47, was scheduled to be executed Tuesday night after being sentenced to death for the 1998 murder of Escolástica Harrison.

On a brief request without any dissents noted, the Supreme Court granted Gutierrez’s last-minute emergency request to temporarily halt his execution.

Gutierrez separately filed a petition urging the high court to grant his appeal which, if successful, would revive his attempt to test certain evidence in the DNA case.

The judges have not yet ruled on the petition. Their rare decision to delay the execution, however, signals that they may be inclined to resume the case when they return from their summer vacation.

The newly issued pause lasts until the court resolves the appeal one way or another.

Prosecutors say Gutierrez and two others beat and stabbed Harrison, an 85-year-old woman, in 1998 in her Brownsville, Texas, home while robbing her of nearly $600,000 in cash. Gutierrez stated that he never entered the woman’s home nor did he know anyone would be hurt.

Gutierrez has long sought DNA testing to find evidence such as a bloodstained shirt, scratches on the woman’s fingernails and a stray hair found wrapped around her finger.

His years-long battle recently ended before the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which concluded that Gutierrez did not meet federal requirements for legal status, i.e., the right to sue.

Gutierrez’s lawyers called that ruling “wrong and pernicious,” saying it conflicts with the Supreme Court ruling. decision last year about another Texas death row inmate’s attempt to request DNA testing.

“The Fifth Circuit ignored this Court’s clear precedent and went out of its way to create an impractical and onerous permanency test, requiring federal courts to investigate the parties’ dispute and litigation history with a fine-toothed comb in order to predict the future, contingent actions by state employees,” they wrote in their petition to the Supreme Court.

In its response, the Texas attorney general’s office told the justices that the man “failed to identify any error” despite having “litigated and re-litigated” challenges for more than 20 years.

“Thus, his punishment is just and his execution will be constitutional,” the state wrote.

This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story