Attorney General Ken Paxton secured a unanimous decision from the Supreme Court of the United States, upholding the rule of law and ensuring that convicted child sexual abuser Danny Rivers will remain in prison.
“In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court sided with Texas and ensured that dangerous convicted criminals will not be able to use procedural games to escape justice,” said Attorney General Paxton. “This is a great win for Texas and the rest of America because it makes it harder for prisoners to weaponize federal courts to attack their state convictions. Rivers was convicted of unbelievably heinous sexual abuse of his own children, and he will face the consequences of his actions.”
Although his own lawyers have stated that he admitted to sexually abusing his two daughters for years, Rivers claimed to have been “wrongly convicted” of sexual abuse, indecency with a child, and possession of child pornography and sought his release through an application in federal court for habeas corpus. Rivers, however, had already unsuccessfully filed such a petition years earlier. Rivers tried to escape the consequences of that earlier unsuccessful petition by claiming it should not count because his appeal had not yet ended. The Supreme Court unanimously disagreed, explaining that Rivers’s theory ignores that “Congress chose to promote finality” and that his “policy arguments do not move the needle in our analysis.”
To read the opinion, click here.
To read Texas’s brief, click here.