Texas appeals court commutes death sentence of killer

AUSTIN, Texas – The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has accepted a second U.S. Supreme Court decision that a 60-year-old death row inmate is intellectually disabled and cannot be executed.

The appeals court on Wednesday wrote that the Supreme Court’s second ruling that convicted killer Bobby James Moore cannot be put to death because of mental disability “is determinative.” It says there’s no alternative but to commute the sentence to life in prison.

The appeals court in June 2018 found James mentally competent for execution, despite an earlier Supreme Court ruling that his intellectual capacity was improperly assessed and agreement by prosecutors that he shouldn’t qualify for the death penalty.

Moore has been on death row since 1980 for the shooting death of 72-year-old Houston grocery store clerk James McCarble during a robbery.