Overview
- James Broadnax, 37, was executed by lethal injection in Huntsville on Thursday after the U.S. Supreme Court denied a final request to halt the punishment.
- Defense filings highlighted a prison video in which cousin Demarius Cummings said he was the shooter and pointed to claims that Cummings’ DNA was on the gun, but courts declined to intervene and Texas officials called the new account questionable.
- Broadnax’s lawyers alleged prosecutors targeted Black jurors using a spreadsheet that bolded only Black names during jury selection, a claim framed under the Supreme Court’s Batson ruling that bars race-based juror strikes.
- Prosecutors introduced Broadnax’s handwritten rap lyrics at sentencing to argue future dangerousness, drawing briefs from artists like Travis Scott and Killer Mike and feeding a wider push in some states to curb the use of creative works in court.
- Tiana Krasniqi, a British law graduate who married Broadnax on April 14, watched the execution and cried “I love you,” as victims’ relatives urged the process to proceed and Texas recorded its third execution of the year and the nation’s tenth.