The Supreme Court stopped Texas from executing its...

The Supreme Court stopped Texas from executing its 300th inmate since capital punishment resumed in the United States in 1977, granting a dramatic last-minute stay to condemned killer Delma Banks.
Banks' claims that he was wrongly convicted of a murder 23 years ago were backed by 3 former federal judges.
His lawyers told justices he was poorly represented at trial, prosecutors improperly kept blacks off the jury and testimony from 2 prosecution witnesses was shaky. Banks is black, his victim was white and the jury was all-white.
The court issued the stay, without comment, about 10 minutes before the 44-year-old was to be put to death for the 1980 murder of 16-year-old Richard Wayne Whitehead, a co-worker at a restaurant.
One of the three former federal judges supporting the Supreme Court intervention was former FBI Director William Sessions.
The stay in Banks' case will remain in effect until the court decides whether to review his case. No justices noted objections to the reprieve.