Texas Court Delays Execution

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has postponed the execution of murderer Tracy Lane Beatty due to the corona virus.  Blake Holland of KLTV reports that Beatty was scheduled to be executed today for the 2003 murder of his 62-year-old mother.  The Texas Daily Independent reported that Beatty had previous convictions for drug possession, theft, weapons possession, a brutal assault against a child under two years of age, and prior assaults against his mother, a correctional officer, and others. While incarcerated, Beatty had a physical altercation with a corrections officer and was found with a shank. He had also joined a prison gang.

Neighbors of Beatty’s mother, Carolyn Click, testified that he had beaten her many times, once so badly that he left her for dead.  In early December of 2003, during a fight with her, Beatty strangled Click to death.  The next day he buried her in the back yard and told the neighbors that she had left town.