Texas Judge Paul C. Murphy recent­ly ordered pros­e­cu­tors to hand over key evi­dence from a 1989 mur­der case to the Innocence Project and the Texas Observer for DNA test­ing. In 2007, the Innocence Project and the Observer filed suit to obtain a one-inch strand of hair that alleged­ly impli­cat­ed Claude Howard Jones (pic­tured) in the killing of a liquor store own­er in San Jacinto County. Other than vague eye­wit­ness accounts and ques­tion­able tes­ti­mo­ny from Jones’s two friends who were also at the scene of the crime (one of whom lat­er recant­ed his tes­ti­mo­ny), the only per­ti­nent phys­i­cal evi­dence that linked Jones to the crime scene was a strand of hair found on the liquor store counter. At Jones’s tri­al in 1990, a foren­sic expert tes­ti­fied that the hair appeared to belong to Jones, but DNA tech­nol­o­gy did not exist at the time to deter­mine if the strand was a match. Jones was exe­cut­ed on Dec. 7, 2000, one of the last exe­cu­tions over­seen by then-Gov. George W. Bush.

If the DNA evi­dence exon­er­ates Jones, it would mark the first time an inno­cent man was exe­cut­ed for a crime that DNA tests lat­er proved he did not com­mit. DNA tests have played a sig­nif­i­cant role in free­ing 17 inmates from death row before they were exe­cut­ed. In the past, attor­neys and reporters have uncov­ered cas­es in which states exe­cut­ed inmates who may have been inno­cent. In 2004, Texas exe­cut­ed Cameron Todd Willingham for start­ing the fire that killed his three chil­dren. Arson experts now say that the fire may have been acci­den­tal, and that Willingham was con­vict­ed based on arson the­o­ries that have since been repu­di­at­ed by scientific advances.

(D. Mann, ​“DNA Could Show if Claude Jones Was Wrongly Executed,” Texas Observer, June 15, 2010). Read more about Executed But Possibly Innocent. See also Innocence.

Tags
Citation Guide