TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE

After 21 days, the last of many Texas prisoners to consistently refuse food ended his hunger strike. In letters to The Texas Tribune, two prisoners spoke out on the dire solitary confinement conditions that led them to starve themselves.

Men sentenced to death in Texas are held in isolation until their execution dates, with little human contact, medical care or legal help, according to a lawsuit filed to improve treatment of the condemned.

Although the number of men refusing food has steadily declined, 38 are still starving themselves to protest Texas policies that often keep prisoners in isolation for years or even decades.

Prisoners have refused food to protest practices that have kept more than 500 people in isolation for more than a decade.

Hundreds of prisoners may participate in the protest beginning Tuesday, the first day of the state’s legislative session. Texas often keeps prisoners in solitary confinement for years or decades.

Texas agencies say they are being hammered by a historic staffing crisis, particularly when it comes to those in the trenches serving the state’s most vulnerable populations.

Texas heat has killed prisoners and cost the state millions in wrongful death and civil rights lawsuits. Prison rights advocates hope a budget surplus next year will finally push lawmakers to invest in air conditioning.

The review came after Gonzalo Lopez escaped on May 12 and eventually killed five people.

The review comes after Gonzalo Lopez escaped from a prison bus last month. Authorities say he killed a family of five before they found and killed him.

Authorities say Gonzalo Lopez killed a man and his four grandchildren in Leon County. He escaped from a prison bus nearly three weeks ago.

Officials are still trying to piece together how Gonzalo Lopez managed to cut through a metal door and hijack a prison bus Thursday. An extensive manhunt continues in Leon County.

Foster had been the getaway driver, not the triggerman, in a killing that first put him on death row. Former Gov. Rick Perry commuted his death sentence to life in prison in 2007.

The latest Texas execution protocols forbid spiritual advisers from praying aloud or touching prisoners as the prisoners are killed. Some members of the high court said they feared overturning the rules would lead to a flood of requests for other religious accommodations during executions.

After halting three Texas executions because of limits placed on spiritual advisers in the death chamber, the high court will hear arguments today over what religious rights the state must accord inmates as it kills them.

John Ramirez was scheduled to die Wednesday. His last request to the state had been to let his pastor hold on to him as he died, something the state denied. The high court wants to hear oral arguments on the matter later this year.

Border-crossing immigrants are being arrested by Texas troopers on state charges like trespassing, and they’re starting to trickle into a prison emptied to house them.

While many Texas prisons are understaffed, some dangerously so, the emptied-out Briscoe Unit in Dilley is in "maintenance mode" as officials scramble to implement the governor's plan to increase the state's role in border enforcement.

A civil liberties group had tried to delay Hummel's death after reporters were excluded from the state’s last execution.

At any given time, thousands of Texas prisoners have been approved for parole but not yet released. At least 42 of those people died in the 12 months after the coronavirus first swept the state.

On Wednesday, the state executed Quintin Jones, 41, for the Tarrant County murder of his great-aunt in 1999.

The bill initially approved by the House aims to cool all of Texas’ prisons before 2029. But even if it is signed into law, the lockups will only be air conditioned if lawmakers provide specific funds for installation.