Judge vacates federal death sentence in 1994 Texas case

HOUSTON (AP) - A judge has vacated the federal death sentence for an Arkansas man convicted of killing a 16-year-old Texas girl in 1994, concluding the inmate can't be put to death because he's intellectually disabled.

Attorneys for Bruce Carneil Webster had challenged his death sentence based on what they argued was previously unavailable evidence that showed medical professionals had determined before his trial he was intellectually disabled.

Webster, now 46, was among five men prosecutors say kidnapped Lisa Rene from her Arlington, Texas, home to get revenge on her two brothers for a botched $5,000 marijuana deal. Over two days, she was taken to Arkansas, gang-raped, bludgeoned with a shovel and buried alive.

Webster is currently housed at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana.