DALLAS — The fight to save the life of death row inmate Melissa Lucio has renewed the belief in conservative state Rep. Jeff Leach that the Texas capital punishment system needs extensive reforms.
Leach, a Plano Republican, has long been a proponent of the death penalty, but the Lucio case has added to his heartburn over executions in the Lone Star State. And like other death penalty cases and issues before it, the effort to save Lucio has showcased the growing bipartisan movement for criminal justice reform, even in deeply conservative Texas.
“It gives me great pause and alarm,” Leach told me during a segment on Sunday’s edition of Lone Star Politics, a political show produced by KXAS (NBC 5) and The Dallas Morning News. “I’ve historically been a supporter of the death penalty in the most heinous cases, but when you’ve got a system that in this case is broken, and it’s not just one thing that’s broken it, literally the system has failed Ms. Lucio at every turn. So yes, it’s caused me pause and great alarm.”
