Jun
26
Written by:
William Lutz
6/26/2010 3:45 PM
CORPUS CHRISTI – Democratic candidates for the state’s two highest courts had one thing in common – they all thrashed Texas's two highest courts.
Supreme Court candidate Jim Sharp, who is running against Justice Debra Lehrmann for the Texas Supreme Court, blasted what he characterized as the corporate orientation of the Supreme Court. He called on rural Texans to come home and start voting Democrat again.
Candidate Bill Moody of El Paso said he won’t walk all the way across the state again in his campaign to unseat Justice Paul Green. But he did praise Bill White, comparing him with John F. Kennedy. Moody called the current court “the most heartless court” in decades. He compared the current court with Joe Barton and suggested the current justices would give aid and comfort to British Petroleum.
Candidate Blake Bailey, who is running against Eva Guzman, told delegates that “If you what what Perry thinks is the law, then vote for my opponent.” He also stated that there is a joke among briefing attorneys to the court: what does an insurance company have to do to lose at the Texas Supreme Court: get sued by another insurance company.
Defense Attorney Keith Hampton of Austin lampooned the current Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in his speech. Hampton said he has more death penalty litigation experience than all the current members of the Supreme Court combined. (Hampton is seeking a seat on the state’s highest criminal court.) Hampton also criticized the court for ruling that a defendant does not have the right to a lawyer who is awake at all parts of a trial and criticized the recent ethics fine of Presiding Judge Sharon Keller, who has denied wrongdoing.