By Juan A. Lozano
Associated Press
A prisoner scheduled to be executed in less than two weeks at a Texas jail has asked for his sentence
to be delayed so he can donate a kidney
.
Ramiro Gonzales is scheduled to receive the lethal injection on July 13 for fatally shooting Bridget Townsend, an 18-year-old woman from southwest Texas whose remains were found nearly two years after she disappeared in 2001.
The inmate's lawyers, Thea Posel and Raoul Schonemann, sent a letter last Wednesday to the governor of Texas, Republican Greg Abbott, in which they asked for a 30-day postponement so that the inmate can be considered a living donor "
for someone who urgently needs a kidney transplant
."
Ramiro Gonzales is, according to Texas doctors, an "excellent candidate" to donate organs because of his very rare blood type.Texas Department of Criminal Justice via AP
The attorneys also separately petitioned the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles for a 180-day reprieve related to the kidney donation.
In their brief to Abbott, Gonzales' attorneys included a letter from Cantor Michael Zoosman, an ordained Jewish clergyman from Maryland who has corresponded with the inmate.
"I have no doubt that Ramiro's desire to be an altruistic kidney donor is not motivated by a last minute attempt to stop or delay his execution. I will go to my grave believing in my heart that this is something Ramiro wants." do to help your soul be right with your God," Zoosman wrote.
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The defense team argued that a transplant team at the University of Texas at Galveston determined that Gonzalez is an "excellent candidate" because of his rare blood type, meaning his donation
could benefit someone who may have difficulty finding a blood type.
compatibility
.
"Pretty much all that's left is the surgery to remove Ramiro's kidney," Posel and Schonemann told Abbott.
The donation process could be complete in a month, according to the doctors.
Texas Department of Criminal Justice policies allow inmates to make organ and tissue donations.
Agency spokeswoman Amanda Hernandez said Gonzales was deemed ineligible after applying to be a donor earlier this year.
She did not give a reason, but Gonzales' attorneys said in her letter that the agency objected because of the pending execution date.
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The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles is scheduled to vote on July 11 on Gonzales' application to that agency.
The prisoner's lawyers made a separate request asking the board to commute his death sentence to a lesser sentence.
They also required that he not be executed if his spiritual adviser is not allowed to hold his hand and place another hand on his heart.
A two-day federal trial on the petition is scheduled to begin in Houston on Tuesday.
Gonzales' demand to delay his execution to donate organs is rare among US death row inmates
, Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, said Friday.
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In 1995, convicted murderer Steven Shelton in Delaware donated a kidney to his mother.
In 2013, Ronald Phillips' execution in Ohio was delayed so his request to donate a kidney to his mother could be reviewed.
Phillips' request was later denied and he was executed in 2017.
"Skeptics will think this is simply an attempt to delay the execution. But if that were the case, I think you would see a lot of requests," said Dunham, whose group does not take a position on capital punishment but has criticized the way in which states carry out executions.
"The history of executions in the United States shows that people do not make organ donation offers in order to delay an execution that will take place anyway," she added.