HOUSTON (AP) — Attorneys who contend a condemned Texas inmate set to die this week is too delusional for execution asked the U.S. Supreme Court Monday to halt his lethal injection and determine whether mentally ill people should be exempt from the death penalty because it is unconstitutionally cruel punishment. Scott Panetti, 56, is set for lethal injection Wednesday for the 1992 shooting deaths of his in-laws at their home in Fredericksburg in the Texas Hill Country. There was “no doubt” Panetti was severely mentally ill “before, during and after the crime for which he has been sentenced to death,” attorneys Gregory Wiercioch and Kathryn Kase told the justices.
Supreme Court asked to halt execution