HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) _ The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals is asking a trial court to determine if a prisoner sentenced to die for a corrections officer’s death during a 2007 escape attempt in Huntsville really is volunteering for execution.
The state’s highest criminal court says condemned inmate John Ray Falk Jr. initially wanted his appeals waived, later decided to retain attorneys, then filed his own document last month seeking to get rid of his lawyers and “expedite this process with as much swiftness as this court might allow.”
The appeals court has given Falk’s trial court 30 days to resolve any questions.
Falk last year was convicted for a second time and received the death penalty for the death of Texas Department of Criminal Justice corrections officer Susan Canfield.