Texas judge won’t let prosecutor cancel scheduled execution of John Ramirez

Nueces County District Attorney Mark Gonzalez, seen at the 2019 Texas Tribune Festival, filed a motion along with John Ramirez’s defense attorney to withdraw the prisoner’s death warrant. (Credit: Marjorie Kamys Cotera for The Texas Tribune)

A Texas state district judge on Tuesday rejected a prosecutor’s request to cancel the scheduled October execution of John Ramirez, whose death last year was halted in part of a yearslong back-and-forth between the Texas prison system and the U.S. Supreme Court over religious rights of condemned prisoners.

Nueces County District Attorney Mark Gonzalez sought to have the execution canceled, saying one of his employees wrongfully asked a court to set the date in April, after the nation’s high court directed the state prison system to let the prisoner’s pastor touch and pray over him at his execution. Gonzalez said he is ethically opposed to the death penalty and did not want an execution warrant for Ramirez issued.