About Judge Baird
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1. Message from Judge Baird
2. Biographical Sketch
3. Significant Cases and Editorials
Judge Baird has written more than 1000 judicial opinions during his service on the bench. Here are excerpts from just three of those opinions.
Freedom of Speech:
Olvera v. State, 806 S.W.2d 546 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991). Declared Texas Anti-Picketing Statute Unconstitutional. "Picketing claims an historic place in American society. Indeed, the body of Supreme Court case law involving picketing stems from political issues reflecting the times, such as labor disputes, the hard fought struggle for civil rights and voting rights, and, more recently, abortion issues. A society dedicated to the preservation of freedom of expression cannot countenance the broad suppression of speech embodied in art. 5154d, §§ 1(1). Accordingly, we hold that art. 5154d, §§ 1(1) is facially overbroad in violation of the First Amendment as applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment."
Worker's Safety:
Sabine Consolidated, Inc. v. State, 806 S.W.2d 553 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991). Upheld prosecution of corporation for providing unsafe workplace which killed two employees. "The purpose of state criminal laws and criminally negligent homicide in particular, is not to set standards for workplace safety. The purpose is to punish one for an illegal act as defined by the penal code, whether that act be done in the workplace or elsewhere. OSHA is not designed to deal with state criminal offenses. Simply because a state criminal law may incidentally concern an area controlled by federal law, this fact alone does not make the state law impermissible. Therefore, state criminal laws are not preempted by federal law aimed at safeguarding the workplace."
Hate Crimes:
Goff v. State, 931 S.W.2d 537 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996) (Baird, J., concurring). Defendant sought reduction of punishment because his victim was homosexual. "I categorically reject appellant's argument that homosexuals are less valuable members of society and, therefore, appellant is less deathworthy for taking a homosexual's life. Appellant's argument ignores the fact that every member of our society has the unalienable right to not be victimized by criminal conduct. ... [A]ppellant's argument is clearly based on the erroneous assumption that certain members of our society are inferior to others. ... If appellant's argument prevailed, future defendants would be entitled to argue that their victims were less valuable members of society because of their age, race, gender, religion or socioeconomic status. Instead, society so abhors appellant's argument that those who perpetrate crimes based on a victim's group affiliation, such as homosexuality, may be punished more severely. There is no place in an enlightened society for one to believe that perpetrating a crime on an individual is less reprehensible because of the victim's age, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation or socioeconomic status.
From the Austin American Statesman (November 25, 2004):
with William F. Sessions
Since November 2002, when its police department's crime lab problems first surfaced, Houston citizens have reacted with dismay to each new revelation.
The problems initially seemed limited to fairly minor physical breakdowns at the lab building. At every turn, however, these problems have multiplied. Most recently, authorities discovered about 280 boxes filled with crime evidence involving as many as 8,000 cases. What is most worrisome is that these cases were considered closed, many with a perpetrator behind bars and the victims seemingly assured that justice had been done. But because these boxes remain uninventoried, we cannot be sure that the right person is in prison, or if the true perpetrator is still on the streets, endangering us all.
We are Texans and members of a bipartisan committee sponsored by the Constitution Project's Death Penalty Initiative. We joined the committee in 1999 because we believe the risk of convicting and executing the wrong people is unacceptably high. Since the initiative's creation, the number of individuals who have been exonerated and released from death row has reached 117 nationwide, including eight from Texas. The discovery of the boxes from the Houston crime lab raises the potential that many more wrongfully convicted people are being housed in our Texas prisons.
While our committee includes members who support the death penalty, and others who oppose it, we all agree that the risk of wrongful convictions is too high and that systemic reforms are urgently needed to try to make the system fairer and more accurate.
One of our recommendations is that states allow DNA and other biological evidence to be properly tested in any case and any time if the evidence might shed light on the guilt or innocence of the inmate, so that we can be as sure as possible that we are prosecuting the right person.
Our committee has not taken a position on a moratorium, but the Houston travesty requires us to join with the many prominent Texans who are now calling for a moratorium until the evidence in the Houston crime lab boxes is inventoried and, if appropriate, tested.
We are in good company. Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt has noted, "I think it would be very prudent for us as a criminal justice system to delay further executions until we have had time to review the evidence." The dean of the Texas Senate, John Whitmire, who represents part of Houston and also chairs the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, joined in the chief's call for a moratorium. In a letter to Gov. Rick Perry, Whitmire stated, "It's just nuts, to sum it up, that we would not hold off on executions until we go through each and every piece of evidence."
Former Gov. Mark White and Charles Terrell, a former chairman of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, have also called on the governor to act, as have major Texas newspapers. Judge Tom Price of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has also recently joined the call for a moratorium.
Yet, within the last few weeks, five executions have gone forward involving death row inmates from Houston, with another scheduled for early December. District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal has resisted an independent review of the crime lab and has joined the trial judges in opposing a postponement of the executions, even just until a proper inventory and any appropriate testing of the evidence is done.
We cannot understand this position. If the evidence confirms the guilt of the person scheduled to be executed, the execution should go forward. But if the evidence exonerates the inmate, no Texan would want to see an execution.
Texans know that the crime lab problems are not just theoretical and are not limited to death row inmates. In 2003, Josiah Sutton was exonerated of a crime he did not commit after spending four years in prison. Earlier this month, George Rodriguez was released after spending more than 17 years in prison. He was convicted on the basis of faulty DNA analysis.
Since reintroduction of the death penalty, Texas has executed 336 men and women. Our state has been responsible for more than 35 percent of all the executions in America. Too many of these executions occurred despite of profound questions about the facts of these cases, including in some instances questions about whether the defendant was actually innocent.
The two safety valves that supposedly prevent our state from executing an innocent person have not worked as they should, and in some cases have failed entirely. The Court of Criminal Appeals, an elected and partisan body, has been criticized by the U.S. Supreme Court for not properly reviewing cases. A just released Texas Monthly article about the court is called "And Justice for Some." And — borrowing a phrase from the Texas oil fields — clemency in Texas is simply a dry hole, with critical facts either not presented to the governor or not meaningfully considered.
Many experts believe that the death penalty does not deter crime. Some of us are not sure one way or the other. But, we should not be deterred from exercising common sense. We have a runaway train with no one at the controls, and that is no way to run a railroad. We support a moratorium.
Judge Baird served on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals from 1990 to 1998. Sessions served as director of the FBI from 1987 to 1993 and, earlier, as chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.
Charlie on
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