Opinion
WR-22 548-05
03-30-2022
EX PARTE CARL WAYNE BUNTION, Applicant
Do Not Publish
ON APPLICATION FOR WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS CAUSE NO. 588227-D IN THE 178th JUDICIAL TH DISTRICT COURT HARRIS COUNTY
ORDER
PER CURIAM
This is a subsequent application for a writ of habeas corpus filed pursuant to the provisions of Texas Code of Criminal Procedure article 11.071, § 5.
Unless we specify otherwise, all references in this order to "Articles" refer to the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.
Applicant was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in 1991 for the 1990 shooting of a police office during a traffic stop. Tex. Penal Code § 19.03(a)(1). We affirmed Applicant's conviction and sentence on direct appeal, Buntion v. State, No. AP-71, 238 (Tex. Crim. App. May 31, 1995) (not designated for publication), and denied his initial Article 11.071 application for habeas corpus relief, Ex parte Buntion, No. WR-22, 548-02 (Tex. Crim. App. Nov. 5, 2003) (not designated for publication). Applicant thereafter filed a subsequent writ application in which he alleged that the "nullification" instruction given at his trial's punishment phase did not allow the jury to give full effect to the mitigating evidence. We granted relief on the subsequent application and remanded the case for a new punishment trial. Ex parte Buntion, No. AP-76, 236 (Tex. Crim. App. Sept. 30, 2009) (not designated for publication).
The trial court held a new punishment trial in February 2012. The jury answered the punishment phase special issues submitted pursuant to Article 37.0711 in a manner requiring the trial court to sentence Applicant to death. We affirmed Applicant's 2012 sentence on direct appeal. Buntion v. State, 482 S.W.3d 58 (2016). We additionally denied relief on Applicant's initial Article 11.071 challenging that sentence. Ex parte Buntion, No. WR-22, 548-04 (Tex. Crim. App. June 7, 2017) (not designated for publication). Applicant is presently set for execution on Thursday, April 21, 2022.
In this, Applicant's first subsequent Article 11.071 application, he attacks the constitutionality of his 2012 sentence on three grounds. In Claim 1, Applicant alleges that his "execution would violate the Eighth Amendment because no legitimate purpose for the death penalty would be served by carrying out his execution after he has spent over thirty years under a sentence of death." In Claim 2, Applicant contends that his
"death sentence is arbitrary, in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, because the punishment is based on the jury's factually inaccurate response to the inherently unreliable future dangerousness special issue." And in Claim 3, Applicant avers, "The 'evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society' under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit executions as a punishment for murder."
We have reviewed the subsequent application and find that Applicant has failed to satisfy the requirements of Article 11.071, § 5(a). Accordingly, we dismiss the subsequent application as an abuse of the writ without considering the claims' merits.
IT IS SO ORDERED