May 15
TEXAS—-new (not serious) execution date
August Execution Date Set for Tyler Man
A 48-year-old Tyler man condemned in 2004 for killing his mother returned
to a Smith County courtroom Wednesday and was ordered to be executed on
Aug. 13.
Tracy Lane Beatty exhausted his state appeals when the Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals denied him habeas corpus relief in a May 6 opinion. The
defendant was brought back to Smith County from death row Wednesday and
241st District Judge Jack Skeen Jr. set his date of execution.
Beatty will pursue federal appears so it is unlikely he will be executed
on that date.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals upheld his capital murder conviction
and death sentence March 11.
Beatty was convicted and sentenced to death by lethal injection by a Smith
County jury for killing Carolyn "Callie" Click, 62, stealing her car,
draining her credit and bank accounts to buy drugs and alcohol, giving
away her personal items and burying her body in a shallow grave behind her
mobile home Nov. 25, 2003.
Beattys lawyers filed the writ of habeas corpus, presenting 10 allegations
that challenged the validity of his conviction and sentence. Skeen
submitted findings of fact and conclusions of law, and recommendation that
relief be denied was followed by the Court of Criminal Appeals.
Defense attorney Jeff Haas told Skeen he would file an appeal in federal
court.
Defense attorneys Robert Perkins and Don Davidson also appeared in court
for the brief hearing, as well as District Attorney Matt Bingham and First
Assistant DA April Sikes.
THE TRIAL
Neighbors testified Ms. Click and Beatty had a rocky relationship and
fought almost daily but that the victim offered her son a place to stay
after he was paroled from prison in October 2003.
Ms. Click reportedly had kicked her son out of her house the day of her
murder. Beatty told family, friends and law enforcement about 5 different
stories before he led authorities to his mother's body and confessed
nearly a month after the murder, evidence showed.
A pathologist testified Ms. Click was suffocated, strangled or smothered
to death. She suffered broken bones in her neck, cracked ribs, blunt force
trauma to her head and a fractured breastbone.
While awaiting the capital murder trial, Beatty was found with a long,
sharp metal shank in jail. Also before the trial began, Beatty was found
in contempt of court for refusing Skeen's order to provide the state with
a handwriting sample.
Parole records indicated Beatty threatened a parole officer and assaulted
his mother, which resulted in his parole being revoked before the capital
murder offense.
Witnesses said Beatty had been arrested 21 times for various offenses,
including injury to his 18-month-old niece in which Beatty shocked her
with an electrical cord, burned her with a cigarette, pulled out her hair
and struck her in the face.
There were 16 incidents where Beatty threatened or attacked prison
employees or showed other acts of violence while in several Texas prisons.
Since 1987, when Beatty was first released from prison on parole, the
defendant has been in and out of prison and has had his parole revoked 4
times. Beatty was on parole at the time of the capital murder.
Beatty once claimed to be a member of the Arian Circle, a white
supremacist prison gang.
(source: Tyler Morning Telegraph)