both in courts and in offices

It was a bizarre and cumbersome procedure. The federal court for the Western District of Texas, housed a few blocks from the TCCA, adopted electronic filing in the mid-1990s. By the turn of the century, paper filings were rapidly becoming obsolete as technology marched on. In law, both in courts and in offices, the electronic file became far more popular than the paper file. At 9:00 a.m. on Thursday, the Flak firm and the Defender Group lawyers were notified that the insanity claim was denied by the TCCA. The court did not believe Donte was mentally ill. This was expected. Minutes after this denial was received, the identical petition was filed electronically in the federal court for the Eastern District of Texas in Tyler. At 9:30 a.m., a Defender Group lawyer named Cicely Avis walked into the clerk's office at the TCCA with the latest filing by the lawyers for Donte Drumm. It was a claim of actual innocence based on the secretly recorded statements by Joey Gamble. Cicely routinely showed up with similar filings, and she and the clerk knew each other well. "What else is coming?" the clerk asked as he processed the petition. "I'm sure there will be something," Cicely said. "Usually is." The clerk finished his paperwork, handed a marked copy back to Cicely, and wished her a good day. Because of the obvious urgency of the matter, the clerk hand delivered a copy of the petition to the offices of all nine justices. Three happened to be in Austin. The other six were scattered around the state. The chief justice was a man by the name of Milton Prudlowe, a longtime member of the court who lived in Lubbock most of the year but kept a small apartment in Austin.