{"id":163029,"date":"2021-10-14T09:41:56","date_gmt":"2021-10-14T13:41:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/?p=163029"},"modified":"2021-10-14T09:41:56","modified_gmt":"2021-10-14T13:41:56","slug":"death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/","title":{"rendered":"Death Row Inmate Who Argued Judge Was Antisemitic Wins New Trial"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"police
vmargineanu \/ iStock \/ Getty Images Plus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Shira Hanau<\/p>\n

A Jewish man who asked for a new trial on the grounds that the judge who sentenced him to death was antisemitic will be granted a new trial.<\/p>\n

Randy Halprin, 44, was originally set to be executed on Oct. 10, 2019 but won a stay from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals after he alleged that the judge who presided over his 2003 murder trial was biased against Jews and referred to him using anti-Semitic slurs, including \u201cf\u2014in\u2019 Jew\u201d and \u201ck-ke.\u201d<\/p>\n

The stay sent Halprin\u2019s case back to Dallas County, where Judge Lela Lawrence Mays heard Halprin\u2019s arguments in June, and this week issued a decision<\/a>\u00a0granting\u00a0Halprin a new trial.<\/p>\n

\u201cJudge Vickers Cunningham possessed anti-semitic prejudice against Halprin which violated Halprin\u2019s constitutional right to a trial in a fair tribunal equal protection, and free exercise of religion,\u201d Mays wrote in her decision.<\/p>\n

Halprin was serving a 30-year sentence for harming a child when he and six other inmates attempted to escape from prison. A police officer was killed during the attempt, and each member of the group, which came to be known as the \u201cTexas 7,\u201d was sentenced to death. Halprin claimed in his trial that he never fired his gun.<\/p>\n

The judge who presided over the original case, Vickers \u201cVic\u201d Cunningham, has been accused of using several antisemitic and racist slurs and, according to the\u00a0Dallas Morning News,<\/a>\u00a0set up a trust fund for his children on the condition that they marry white Christians of the opposite sex. Court documents quoted a childhood friend of Cunningham\u2019s who said the judge\u00a0\u201ctook special pride\u201d in sentencing the Texas 7 to death \u201cbecause they included Latinos and Jews.\u201d<\/p>\n

Several Jewish groups got involved in Halprin\u2019s case<\/a>\u00a0in recent years as he sought a new trial. The American Jewish Committee, Central Conference of American Rabbis, Men of Reform Judaism and Union for Reform Judaism were among those filing a joint amicus brief in support of Halprin\u2019s 2019 appeal, and more than 100 Jewish lawyers in Texas signed on.<\/p>\n

The brief made the case that the appeal was not about Halprin\u2019s guilt, but about Cunningham\u2019s antisemitism.<\/p>\n

\u201c[T]hose issues are irrelevant, because questions of guilt and punishment follow a fair trial; they do not precede it,\u201d it said. \u201cAnd if Judge Cunningham is the bigot described in the application, a fair trial has not yet happened.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0A Jewish man who asked for a new trial on the grounds that the judge who sentenced him to death was antisemitic will be granted a new trial.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13297,"featured_media":124470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,10],"tags":[13193,11127],"section":[],"coauthors":[12308],"yoast_head":"\nDeath Row Inmate Who Argued Judge Was Antisemitic Wins New Trial - Jewish Exponent<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Death Row Inmate Who Argued Judge Was Antisemitic Wins New Trial - Jewish Exponent\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u00a0A Jewish man who asked for a new trial on the grounds that the judge who sentenced him to death was antisemitic will be granted a new trial.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jewish Exponent\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jewishexponent\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-10-14T13:41:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-1019036866.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"855\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"409\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"JTA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@jewishexponent\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@jewishexponent\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"JTA\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"JTA\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/#\/schema\/person\/cb0f703e468e172d7553b0448c58dbbd\"},\"headline\":\"Death Row Inmate Who Argued Judge Was Antisemitic Wins New Trial\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-10-14T13:41:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-10-14T13:41:56+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\"},\"wordCount\":421,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-1019036866.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Antisemitism\",\"crime\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Headlines\",\"National\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.jewishexponent.com\/death-row-inmate-who-argued-judge-was-antisemitic-wins-new-trial\/\",\"name\":\"Death Row Inmate Who Argued Judge Was Antisemitic Wins New Trial - 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