Today marks the fourth anniversary of the murder of Stella Michelle “Doc” Ray.
The state’s highest appeals court has yet to announce its decision concerning the case of Micah Crofford Brown of Greenville, Ray’s estranged husband, who was convicted of capital murder in Ray’s death and was sentenced to death by lethal injection.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reviewed the case in November 2014.
“It’s still pending,” said Hunt County District Attorney Noble D. Walker Jr.
Both the defense and prosecution attorneys waived oral arguments before the court.
“We haven’t gotten any word,” Walker said Saturday. “We’re just hanging tight until we get some kind of word back from them.”
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals typically issues its opinions on Wednesday mornings.
Brown was convicted of capital murder and received the death penalty in May 2013, following a trial in the 354th District Court. He does not yet have a death sentence scheduled.
An appeal is automatic in capital murder cases.
Ray was shot and killed in Greenville on the night of July 20, 2011 as the result of a domestic dispute between her and Brown.
Prior to the murder Ray, 36, from Greenville, had been working as a school teacher in Caddo Mills but at the time of her death had just completed a doctorate program at Texas A&M University-Commerce, and was moving from Greenville the next day to take a job teaching at a college in Marshall.
It was the first death penalty issued from Hunt County since Adam Kelly Ward in 2007, for the capital murder of Michael “Pee Wee” Walker. Ward likewise does not yet have an execution date scheduled.