D.A. Seeks to Overturn Texas Governor’s Pardon of Man Who Killed Protester

The prosecutor accused the governor of violating the constitutional separation of powers doctrine by intervening with the actions of a court.

A Texas prosecutor said on Tuesday that he would seek to have a court overturn Gov. Greg Abbott’s pardon of a man convicted of fatally shooting a Black Lives Matter protester in Austin in the summer of 2020.

The Republican governor’s pardon last month of the man, Daniel S. Perry, who had argued that he was acting in self-defense against an armed protester, was cheered by conservatives as a recognition of the state’s “stand your ground” protections.

But it was also met with outrage by the protester’s family, civil rights groups and José Garza, the Travis County district attorney whose office had secured the conviction.

On Tuesday, Mr. Garza, a Democrat, said he would petition the state’s highest criminal appeals court to overturn the pardon on the grounds that the governor had violated the constitutional separation of powers doctrine by intervening with a court’s actions.

“It’s up to the legal system whether a person is guilty or innocent,” Mr. Garza said at a news conference, where he was joined by relatives of the slain protester, Garrett Foster, a 28-year-old former mechanic in the U.S. Air Force.

But a lawyer for Mr. Perry countered that the governor had a well-established authority to grant pardons, and accused Mr. Garza of a “frivolous pursuit to overturn Governor Abbott’s pardon.”