1. NOPE

    Federal Judge Denies TX Execution Stay

    This undated handout photo provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice shows Duane Buck. Defense attorneys are calling on Texas Gov. Rick Perry to halt the execution of Buck who is scheduled to be put to death Thursday because jurors heard testimony during sentencing in his 1997 trial that blacks are more likely to pose future dangers to the public. (AP Photo/Texas Department of Criminal Justice)

    Handout / AP Photo

    The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has denied a stay in the Thursday execution of Duane Buck, who was sentenced to death for a 1995 double murder in Houston. The decision comes after a Texas pardon board unanimously voted not to suggest Gov. Rick Perry commute Buck’s sentence to life in prison. The case has drawn national media attention because Buck's was one of six capital trials that Texas’s then–attorney general John Cornyn said might have been skewed by racist testimony. With the court’s ruling Thursday, Buck will likely be put to death by the end of the day.

    Read it at Houston Chronicle