Samuel Junior Sanchez had served around 15 years of a 75-year sentence for a violent road-rage incident and had seemingly exhausted all appeals when his sister contacted a group of Abilene attorneys in 2021 about new information she hoped might finally give her brother another chance at life.
As an angry young man, Sanchez had chased down and shot at a car whose driver honked at him, resulting in the injury and permanent paralysis of a passenger and Sanchez’s indictment for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in 2006. But Sanchez was now in his 50s, and he’d radically changed in prison. Though he never expected to live long enough to win release, he’d been keeping journals and dedicating himself for a decade to daily bible study, prayer, and counseling younger men to avoid prison gangs and violent behavior.
Sanchez was among about 300 criminal defendants who’d received notice that they’d been affected by a nationally publicized misconduct scandal, described blandly by the Midland County District Attorney’s office in a form letter as an “ethical situation.” During Sanchez’s trial—and during his initial unsuccessful appeal—a Midland County assistant district attorney named Ralph Petty simultaneously worked as a paid law clerk for the judges overseeing his and other cases, while concealing that double role from defense attorneys.
