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Prosper murder suspect's death sentence overturned by appeals court
By Danny Gallagher, McKinney Courier-Gazette
A federal appeals court overturned the death penalty sentence of a man convicted for a Prosper robbery style murder because of his mental wellbeing.
The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals filed a 2 to 1 decision to stop the execution of 42-year-old Eric Lynn Moore who has been sitting on Texas Death Row since 1991.
A Collin County district court convicted and sentenced Moore to death along with Kenneth Eugene Bruce in connection with the robbery and murder of 54-year-old Helen Elizabeth Ayers and 58-year-old Robert Ayers of Prosper on Dec. 10, 1990.
The 5th Circuit Court upheld a previous ruling from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals late last week.
"After considering the evidence, the district court found Moore to be mentally retarded," the court wrote, "and enjoyed the State from executing him."
Moore's attorney, Scott Smith of Sherman, said he and his co-counsel had been working since 2002 on getting a higher court to examine Moore's "element of retardation" in his murder conviction.
"It's taken us that long to get to the point weÕre at now,Ó Smith said.
Smith said the state's standard for determining mental retardation in criminal cases had not been specifically established by the Texas legislature.
"When Atkins (a legal claim for mental retardation) came out in 2002, it did not define for practioners what retardation is," Smith said. "So we left it to the state to determine retardation and Eric was one first cases to come through the pike, Texas had not established that standardÉThat uncertainty caused the case to go up and down the district courts and federal courts.Ó
The 5th Circuit Court agreed Moore had met that standard or as Smith put it, "at least two of them did."
Circuit Judge Jerry Smith cast the only dissenting vote on Moore's case.
"Haphazardly-applied standards of review, casually-read caselaw and superficially-scrutinized evidence make for an unfortunate combination," Judge Smith wrote in his dissenting opinion. "Here, they result in shallow analysis and the wrong result. The only mitigation is that the majority opinion is unpublished, so it is not binding on anyone or any court."
A representative from the Texas Attorney General's Office said prosecutors have until Sept. 4 to submit a petition to rehear the case in a higher court. The same representative could not be reached for additional comment by presstime.
Contact Danny Gallagher at dgallagher@acnpapers.com.
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