Texas Seven prison escapee Randy Halprin’s conviction and death sentence should be thrown out because the judge in his 2003 capital murder trial harbored anti-Semitic views, a state district judge recommended Monday.
Judge Lela Mays’ recommendation comes about three years after the state’s highest criminal court, the Court of Criminal Appeals, halted Halprin’s scheduled execution and asked Mays to review the case. Halprin, who is Jewish, has argued he didn’t receive a fair trial because former State District Judge Vickers Cunningham was prejudiced against him.
The state’s Court of Criminal Appeals will make the final decision. There is no timetable for the high court to rule.
Halprin is one of seven inmates, known as the Texas Seven, who escaped from the John B. Connally Unit near Kenedy in December 2000 and fatally shot Irving police Officer Aubrey Hawkins during a robbery that Christmas Eve.
All members of the Texas Seven were later convicted and sentenced to death except for Larry Harper, who killed himself before being captured. Four were executed. Only Patrick Murphy remains on death row with Halprin.
Halprin has denied being one of the men who shot Hawkins. Before escaping prison in 2000, he was serving a 30-year sentence for beating a child in Tarrant County.
Mays has previously suggested Halprin get a new trial, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled it needed to hear more evidence before a final decision.
Tarrant County prosecutors are handling Halprin’s appeal after Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot recused his office because Cunningham’s daughter works for him. Following a three-day hearing in August to determine whether Cunningham was prejudiced, District Attorney Sharen Wilson and prosecutor Anne Grady also agreed Halprin’s right to a fair trial was violated.
Mays’ recommendation issued Monday adopted the defense team’s findings. She wrote that the Court of Criminal Appeals should find that Halprin “was denied rights to the free exercise of religion, due process of the law, and equal protection of the laws” and should “vacate the judgments of conviction and death” against him.
Cunningham could not immediately be reached; he has previously declined to comment on the case. His law office declined to comment Tuesday.
Tivon Schardl, a lawyer for Halprin, said in a written statement the Constitution “allows only one remedy in cases of judicial bias,” which he said is to vacate the prior judgment and start over with a new trial.
“Due process and equality before the law found their champion in Judge Mays today, as did the people of Dallas County and the State of Texas,” Schardl said. “We are confident the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals will follow the law, accept the State’s concessions and adopt the trial court’s recommendations.”
Halprin’s attorneys have accused Cunningham of often using derogatory language when talking about minorities, including using the N-word and calling Halprin “that [expletive] Jew” during his trial. Cunningham has denied the allegation, saying the accusations were “lies from my estranged brother and his friends.”
His brother, Bill Cunningham, told The Dallas Morning News in 2018 that Vic Cunningham was a lifelong racist. The then-judge said he wasn’t a bigot but confirmed a trust fund set up for his children has a stipulation that includes rewards for marrying a person who is white, Christian and the opposite sex.
In her recommendation for a new trial last year, Mays wrote that Cunningham “harbored actual, subjective bias against Halprin” because he is Jewish. She said his bias affected the criminal process, including jury selection and what evidence was allowed during trial.
“Judge Cunningham’s bias towards Halprin not only harmed him, but it undermined the public’s confidence that criminal justice has been — and will be — dispensed impartially,” Mays wrote at the time.
