page_title: Capital punishment in Texas
section_title: Opposition
hierarchical_section_title: Capital punishment in Texas / Opposition
context_page_description: Capital punishment is a legal penalty in the state of Texas, part of the United States.
  In 1982, the state became the first jurisdiction in the world to carry out an execution by lethal injection, when it put to death Charles Brooks Jr.. It was the first execution in the state since 1964.
  Texas, which is the second most populous state of the Union, has executed 570 offenders from the U.S. capital punishment resumption in 1976 to July 8, 2020, more than a third of the national total.
context_section_description: The Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, a 501(c)(3) grassroots membership organization was founded in 1998.  TCADP has members across the state of Texas working to educate their local communities on the problems of the Texas death penalty.  TCADP hosts multiple education and training opportunities each year around the state including releasing an annual report on December 7 and a day-long annual conference which includes workshops, panel discussions, networking and awards.  The conference is held in Austin during legislative years and in other Texas Cities in non-legislative years (2012: San Antonio).  TCADP opened a state office in Austin in 2004 with a paid program coordinator and hired an executive director in 2008.  TCADP is affiliated with the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
   The March to Abolish the Death Penalty is the current name of an event organized each October since 2000 by several Texas anti-death penalty organizations, including Texas Moratorium Network, the Austin chapter of the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement and Texas Students Against the Death Penalty. Anti-Death Penalty Alternative Spring Break is an annual event started by Texas Moratorium Network in 2004 and now co-organized by Texas Students Against the Death Penalty. It serves as a training ground for students who oppose the death penalty.
  The Death Row Inner-Communalist Vanguard Engagement (D.R.I.V.E.) consists of several male death row inmates from the Polunsky Unit. Through a variety of non-violent strategies, they have begun launching protests against the perceived bad conditions at Polunsky, in particular, and capital punishment, in general. They actively seek to consistently voice complaints to the administration, to organize grievance filing to address problems. They occupy day rooms, non-violently refuse to evacuate their cells or initiate sit-ins in visiting rooms, hallways, pod runs and recreation yards when there is the perception of an act of abuse of authority by guards (verbal abuse; physical abuse; meals/recreations or showers being wrongly denied; unsanitary day rooms and showers being allowed to persist; medical being denied; paper work being denied; refusing to contact higher rank to address the problems and complaints) and when alleged retaliation (thefts, denials, destruction of property; food restrictions; wrongful denials of visits; abuse of inmates) is carried out in response to their grievances.
  In 2016, Pfizer and other drug manufacturers banned the use of their products for lethal injections.  Texas and other states were reported to be finding it difficult to obtain supplies of drugs for executions.
caption: Protesters gather at the front gate of the Texas Governor's Mansion during the "6th Annual March to Stop Executions
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "SONY", "Image Model": "DSC-P73", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2005:10:29 17:02:42", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "340", "Image CustomRendered": "Normal", "Image ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "Image WhiteBalance": "Auto", "Image SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "Image Contrast": "Normal", "Image Saturation": "Normal", "Image Sharpness": "Normal", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Make": "SONY", "Thumbnail Model": "DSC-P73", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail DateTime": "2005:10:29 17:02:42", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2440", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "19564", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/30", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2005:10:29 17:02:42", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2005:10:29 17:02:42", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "8", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash fired, compulsory flash mode, red-eye reduction mode, return light not detected", "EXIF FocalLength": "6", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2048", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1536", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed"}