Tules v. Zapata v. W. J. Estelle, Jr., Director, Texas Department of Corrections

GEE, Circuit Judge:

Appellant Zapata killed her husband on May 3, 1971, shooting him to death with a revolver which she reloaded in the process. Three months later she was tried in the Texas courts and convicted of murder over her plea of self defense. She now seeks habeas corpus relief, urging the following as her grounds: (1) that the trial court should have ordered a competency hearing sua sponte; (2) that her attorney was ineffective in failing to request a competency hearing; and (3) that she was denied due process at her murder trial because at the time of her prosecution she was…