"Fortunately, Reeves County is located in the seventh judicial region, and its commisioners court had signed on to be a member of the West Texas Regional Public Defender for Capital Cases, which billed itself as a type of 'murder insurance.'"

"'None of them or anybody on the court could ever remember having a capital murder case,' Farmer said. 'That's a million dollars we don’t have. We would have had to borrow some money.'

"But through some supreme fortune, the county had just signed on to a new pilot program, a regional capital public defender's office..."