New DNA Test Undermines Evidence For Texas Execution

[marmar]

from NPR:



Claude Jones was put to death Dec. 7, 2000 for the murder of an East Texas liquor store owner. The only piece of physical evidence the prosecution had was a strand of hair. They argued it belonged to Jones and that put him at the scene of the crime.

A decade after Jones' execution, the Texas Observer and a group dedicated to "exonerating wrongfully convicted people" put that strand of hair through DNA testing and found that it very likely didn't come from Jones.

In a statement, Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project said:

The DNA results prove that testimony about the hair sample on which this entire case rests was just wrong. This is yet another disturbing example of a miscarriage of justice in Texas capital murder prosecutions. Unreliable forensic science and a completely inadequate post-conviction review process cost Claude Jones his life.

The Texas Observer doesn't gloss over the fact that Jones was often times violent. They report he was born in 1940, was in prison three different times and that, once, while in a Kansas prison, "Jones allegedly doused another inmate with lighter fluid and set him on fire." ........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/11/12/131274985/new-dna-evidence-undermines-texas-execution

[elocs]

1. Here yesterday:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4611544