I was priviledged to be asked to author an article on closing arguments that appears in the new Prosecutor. As indicated in that article and in it's footnotes, it is dedicated to my former collegue Gil Simon Epstein.

As some of you know, Gil was murdered on September 18th, 1996 in the parking lot of the Jewish Community Center in Houston when returning to his car after his weekly basketball game there. The two exconvicts who robbed him at gunpoint were on bicycles, and his killer was still on parole for attempted murder. They killed Gil because they found his badge while searching his wallet and assumed he was HPD. I know to this audience it goes without saying that they were crackhead, wandering, predatory thugs, worse than any killer animal known to man. Hell, they had even stolen the bicycles they were using.

His killer, whose name I shall never honor by stating again, was executed in March of 2004 thanks to the wonderful work of Chuck Rosenthal, Lucy Davidson and a host of HPD and DA employees.

After his murder, Rob and others at the TDCAA were instrumental in assisting longtime former State Rep. Ron Wilson and I in achieving some changes in the law as they concerned his situation.

At the time of his murder he was my courtroom partner and my friend. He was an amazing person.

I would like to thank every prosecutor who prosecutes death penalty cases. The death penalty is a necessary evil in our world, and rest assured your work in this area not only keeps killers from killing again but does bring relief and closure to victims of these crimes. You are doing the Lord's work, my friends. I know of where I speak, unfortunately, in this regard. I watched the execution but felt an almost immediate relief of the grief I had been carrying for 8 years. It may not help everyone, and I only want to speak for myself, but it sure made me more of a person again like I was before the murder.

If you are so inclined during the next month, I would be greatly appreciative if you would say a prayer for his surviving family, which includes his brother, his parents, his nephew and numerous other relatives on several continents.

His parents have become a set of second parents to my family, as well as to many other families of gil's friends and coworkers. They and I and many others still work to keep Gil's name alive in the world and to seek to make his death seem less pointless.

You are missed, my Meshugina.

[This message was edited by Greg Gilleland on 09-02-06 at .]

Gil Esptein's name is on the Prosecutor's Memorial at the National Advocacy Center. For more information, click here.