11 April 2026 :
April 8, 2026 - Texas. James Broadnax's appeal rejected
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has denied an appeal from death row inmate James Broadnax.
The appeal came after his co-defendant, Damarius Cummings, claimed to be the shooter in a 2008 double murder.
The court said on Tuesday that even if Broadnax lied in his confession, it was not a due process violation.
Broadnax, 37, is scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection April 30 in Huntsville.
James Broadnax was sentenced to death in 2009 in the 2008 killings of Stephen Swan and Matthew Butler outside their Garland music studio.
Broadnax and Broadnax's cousin, Demarius Cummings, who were both 19 at the time, got away with only $2. Broadnax was later convicted and sentenced to death. Cummings received life without parole.
Last month, Cummings filed a signed declaration that he was the one who shot and killed the two victims, not Broadnax, and Broadnax's attorneys filed with the Court of Criminal Appeals seeking to block his execution in light of the new evidence.
Cummings claimed in his declaration that the DNA evidence found on the gun links back to him, not Broadnax.
Broadnax is scheduled to die by lethal injection on April 30. He has two petitions up for review by the Supreme Court of the United States; one for claims related to racial discrimination, and one related to the use of rap lyrics in his sentencing process. A decision is expected in the days leading up to his execution date.
The Court of Criminal Appeals on Tuesday issued an opinion denying the motion stating that even though Cummings stated he pulled the trigger, Broadnax had not recanted his earlier confession. "I am unwilling to hold that applicant's confessions were false when applicant hasn't bothered to recant them," the judge said in the order. " And even if he had recanted, I find problematic the notion that he caused his own due-process violation by making voluntary inculpatory statements."
The order went on to state that even if Broadnax's confession was a lie, it did not justify a due process violation.
"Applicant's claim that he lied when he confessed must fail," the judge wrote. "He hasn't recanted his confessions, his own lies – if that's what they are – do not give rise to a due-process violation. He is not actually innocent or innocent of the death penalty, and his claims are barred because they do not fall within an exception to the subsequent application prohibition."
Sheri Johnson, a professor of law at Cornell, has consulted on the case over the past two years. She noted that the order does not take the issue of DNA on the murder weapon into account.
“I think that this evidence, while it's not important in the question of guilt, is very important in the question of sentence,” she said.
Johnson also argued that if Broadnax did recant his statement, likely nobody would have believed it.
"It doesn't make any sense because he could not control Mr. Cummings," Johnson said. "If he simply said I was not the shooter, I can't imagine that anyone would believe that or take that allegation seriously standing alone." For the Broadnax case, also see HoC 21/08/2009 and 23/03/2026.
