COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — As a judge considers arguments from prosecutors and defense attorneys over whether delusional beliefs about the legal system are enough to keep a South Carolina prisoner from being executed, the inmate himself decided to weigh in with his own handwritten legal papers.
Just weeks before Steven Bixby was set to die earlier this year, the state Supreme Court stopped his execution and asked a lower court to evaluate if his lawyers are unable to defend him because of beliefs Bixby holds, like that most laws are unconstitutional, that citizens have an absolute right to defend their property to the death and that judges who rule against him are guided by Satan.
Bixby, 58, was convicted of the 2003 killing of two police officers who came to his Abbeville home to discuss a dispute between the family and a construction crew that had come to widen the road. His parents were also charged with murder and have since died, but Bixby remains on death row.
Bixby’s lawyers argued at a hearing last month that he’s so convinced the current U.S. legal system is unconstitutional and wrong, he refuses to share information they need to help him avoid the death chamber. Prosecutors countered that Bixby’s anti-government beliefs are not his own individual delusions and are shared by others, and that he understands very well why the state wants to put him to death.
