Emergency application · Capital case
Autopsy reports and cross-examination
Charles Victor Thompson v. Texas
What did the Court do?
The Court denied the request on January 28, 2026 and refused to halt the execution.
Emergency rulings are temporary and do not decide the underlying case.
What's being asked
Charles Victor Thompson, a Texas prisoner sentenced to death, asked the Supreme Court to pause his execution, scheduled for January 28, 2026. His petition says substitute medical examiners presented and endorsed an absent pathologist’s autopsy findings at his trials, violating his right to confront witnesses. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals threw out his later state challenge without reviewing its claims and refused a request to pause the execution.
What the Court did
The Court refused to pause Thompson’s execution and denied his petition for certiorari (a request for Supreme Court review). The order gives no explanation, and the Court did not publish how the justices voted; it did not decide his underlying claims.
What it means
This emergency request concerned only a temporary pause, not whether Thompson’s constitutional claims are correct. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals’ order remains in place: it threw out his later state challenge without reviewing its claims. There is no related Supreme Court case on the underlying claims, and the application was not set for argument.
Sources
Facts on this page come from the Supreme Court docket, orders, and opinions for No. 25A847. The answers restate that record in plain words; explainer copy is written from the record and the filings only.