this morning while watching an interview with Bush about Saddam - Bush being a Texan - i remembered how my eighth grade history teacher had told us that there is/was a law in Texas where one could plea “He needed killin’”. is this true? is it still in effect? what are the conditions in which it can be used? and what would be the verdict/sentence in comparison to guilty, not guilty, manslaughter, self-defense, etc.?
Heh…no. Your teacher was “whooshed”. This gets passed around on joke lists about things “Northeners visiting the South need to know” like this one (warning: annoying sound) or apocryphal stories of Old West murder trials where the whole transcript was "Your Honor, he needed’ killin’ " “You got that right! Case dismissed!”
If an obviously guilty person gets off on a dubious self-defense charge, you may hear someone say they employed the "he needed killin’ " defense, but no such thing exists formally in Texas law.
-“Doc” pravnik, Texas lawyuh