Senate votes to make more child killers subject to death penalty


March 30

TEXAS----bill to expand state death penalty

Senate votes to make more child killers subject to death penalty

Those who murder a child up through the age of 10 would face the death penalty
in Texas under a bill approved by the Senate Wednesday. The measure by Sen.
Joan Huffman, R-Houston, would raise the age of a child - from the current 6 to
10 years old - that would trigger a capital offense under the state's penal
code. The legislation, approved on a 28-2 vote, now goes to the House.

Texas currently has the youngest age limit for defining a capitol offense in
the murder of a child. Most states classify a child's murder as a capital crime
under the age of 12, although Wyoming sets the threshold at age 17. Huffman
said her legislation would bring Texas more in line with other states when it
comes to determining whether a child killer should be subject to the death
penalty.

More persons have been executed in Texas than any other state. In the last
three decades, 466 persons have been put the death under the state's penal
code, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. On Tuesday, a
House committee heard testimony on a bill that would abolish the death penalty
in the state, a measure that has little chance of passage this year.

(source: Dallas Morning News)