Entries tagged with “Claude Jones”
Issues
Dec 03, 2010
OP-ED: “Capital Punishment and Human Fallibility”
A recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal by Barry Scheck, co-director of the Innocence Project, highlighs flaws in Texas’s death penalty system that led to the execution of Claude Jones (pictured). Then-governor George Bush rejected Jones’s application for a reprieve. Bush was not informed that the reprieve would allow time for DNA tests to be performed on a strand of hair that was found at the crime scene. This hair had been…
Issues
Nov 12, 2010
Another Texas Execution Thrown in Doubt by New DNA Tests
Recent DNA tests raise serious doubts about the conviction of a man executed in Texas in 2000. The tests revealed that a strand of hair found at the scene of a liquor-store shooting did not belong to Claude Jones, as was originally implied by the prosecution. Instead, the hair belonged to the victim. Jones was executed for the murder of the store’s owner. The strand of hair was the only piece of physical evidence that placed Jones at the scene of the crime,…
Issues
Jun 16, 2010
DNA Evidence Could Show If Texas Executed an Innocent Man
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…
Issues
Sep 10, 2007
Judge Blocks Texas From Destroying Evidence in Case of Possible Wrongful Execution
A Texas judge blocked the destruction of DNA evidence that could prove the innocence of a man who was executed in 2000. A joint motion filed by a coalition of concerned groups sought DNA testing on a hair taken from the crime scene in the case of Claude Jones. In addition, the groups asked the court to impose a restraining order to prevent Texas from destroying the evidence while the court considers their request for DNA testing. Judge Elizabeth Coker granted the restraining order request and…
Issues
Apr 19, 2005
Attorneys Seek DNA Testing In Case of Executed Texas Man
Attorney Barry Scheck plans to ask Texas Governor Rick Perry to order DNA testing in the case of Claude Jones, who maintained his innocence until his execution in December 2000. Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project, says Jones’ conviction was largely based on dubious evidence. The state’s case against him included testimony from an accomplice linking Jones to the crime and the report of a state forensic scientist who examined a one-inch length of hair found at the crime scene. The…