Supreme Court rules out death penalty for Texas inmate

HOUSTON (AP) — A long legal fight over whether a Texas death row inmate could be executed ended today after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the 59-year-old man is intellectually disabled and thus cannot be put to death.

The Supreme Court's ruling came after prosecutors with the Harris County District Attorney's Office agreed with Bobby James Moore's attorneys that he should be spared the death penalty. The Texas Attorney General's Office had asked to take over the case in an effort to carry out the execution.

"The Harris County District Attorney's Office disagreed with our state's highest court and the attorney general to stand for justice in this case. The U.S. Supreme Court agreed. Bobby Moore is intellectually disabled," District Attorney Kim Ogg said in a statement.

Cliff Sloan, Moore's attorney, said he was "very pleased that justice will be done."

Moore fatally shot 72-year-old Houston grocery store clerk James McCarble in 1980 during a robbery. He has been on death row for nearly 39 years.

This was the second time Moore's case had come before the high court. In 2017, the Supreme Court said the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals had used outdated standards to decide that Moore was not intellectually disabled. The case went back to the Texas appeals court, which in June again ruled Moore was not mentally disabled.

The Supreme Court in 2002 barred execution of mentally disabled people but has given states some discretion to decide how to determine intellectual disability. However, justices have wrestled with how much discretion to allow.