Homicide

US Supreme Court gives reprieve to Texas inmate facing execution next week for killing 4

Associated Press
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In this photo taken Jan. 7, 2015, Texas death row inmate Lester Bower, 67, is photographed in an interview cage at the visiting area of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit near Livingston, Texas. Bower, set to be executed next week for fatally shooting four men at an airplane hangar more than 30 years ago, won a reprieve Thursday, Feb. 5, 2015, from the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices gave no reason for the reprieve, saying only that it would be lifted automatically if they deny an appeal or act on it. (AP Photo/Michael Graczyk) (The Associated Press)

In this photo taken Jan. 7, 2015, Texas death row inmate Lester Bower, 67, is photographed in an interview cage at the visiting area of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit near Livingston, Texas. Bower, set to be executed next week for fatally shooting four men at an airplane hangar more than 30 years ago, won a reprieve Thursday, Feb. 5, 2015, from the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices gave no reason for the reprieve, saying only that it would be lifted automatically if they deny an appeal or act on it. (AP Photo/Michael Graczyk) (The Associated Press)

In this photo taken Jan. 7, 2015, Texas death row inmate Lester Bower, 67, speaks on a phone in an interview cage at the visiting area of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Polunsky Unit near Livingston, Texas. Bower, set to be executed next week for fatally shooting four men at an airplane hangar more than 30 years ago, won a reprieve Thursday, Feb. 5, 2015, from the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices gave no reason for the reprieve, saying only that it would be lifted automatically if they deny an appeal or act on it. (AP Photo/Michael Graczyk) (The Associated Press)

A condemned Texas inmate set to die next week for killing four men in North Texas more than 30 years ago has received a reprieve from the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a brief order Thursday, the high court indefinitely put off the lethal injection of 67-year-old Lester Bower Jr.

The justices gave no reason for the ruling, saying only that the reprieve would be lifted if they deny or act on his appeals.

Bower is among the longest-serving Texas death row inmates. He had been scheduled for execution Tuesday.

He was convicted of fatally shooting four men in 1983 at an airplane hangar on a Grayson County ranch about 60 miles north of Dallas.

The victims included a county sheriff's deputy and a former Sherman police officer.