Texas Judge Recommends Denying Death-Row Prisoner Rodney Reed’s Innocence Claim

A Texas dis­trict court judge has rec­om­mend­ed that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) deny death-row pris­on­er Rodney Reed​’s inno­cence claim and allow his con­vic­tion and death sen­tence to stand for the 1996 mur­der of Stacey Stites. In a November 1, 2021 deci­sion after ten days of tes­ti­mo­ny in July and clos­ing state­ments in October, Bastrop County District Court Judge J.D. Langley issued Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Recommendations that Reed’s con­vic­tion should be upheld. In so doing, Langley cred­it­ed every pros­e­cu­tion wit­ness over every wit­ness pre­sent­ed by Reed’s defense counsel. 

The TCCA had stayed Reed’s exe­cu­tion on November 15, 2019, less than one week before he was sched­uled to be put to death and returned his case to the Bastrop County dis­trict court to review Reed’s claims that pros­e­cu­tors pre­sent­ed false tes­ti­mo­ny and sup­pressed excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence and that Reed is actu­al­ly inno­cent. The appeals court retained juris­dic­tion over the case and direct­ed the tri­al court to make rec­om­men­da­tions on how it should rule in the case.

At the hear­ing, Reed’s lawyers pre­sent­ed evi­dence that Reed, who is Black, was hav­ing an affair with Stites, who is white; that Stites was actu­al­ly mur­dered by her abu­sive fiancé, Jimmy Fennell; and that Fennell, who at that time was a police offi­cer in Giddings, Texas, had framed Reed for the mur­der. Numerous wit­ness­es tes­ti­fied that they had seen Stites togeth­er with Reed on pri­or occa­sions, heard Fennell threat­en to kill her if she cheat­ed on him, and heard Fennell admit to the killing. Two foren­sics experts tes­ti­fied that Stites died hours ear­li­er than the pros­e­cu­tion had claimed, at a time that Fennell had said she was with him. Fennell took the stand and denied that he had com­mit­ted the killing.

Langley accept­ed Fennell’s tes­ti­mo­ny on every dis­put­ed issue over the con­trary tes­ti­mo­ny of a dozen sep­a­rate defense wit­ness­es. The court also reject­ed Reed’s chal­lenges that pros­e­cu­tors pre­sent­ed false foren­sic tes­ti­mo­ny, cred­it­ing the tri­al tes­ti­mo­ny of the prosecution’s local foren­sic exam­in­ers over that of Reed’s nation­al­ly known forensic experts.

The coun­ty court trans­mit­ted its find­ings and rec­om­men­da­tions to the TCCA, which will con­sid­er Judge Langley’s rec­om­men­da­tion, but make its own final ruling.

Reed’s hear­ing began July 19, with his defense team pre­sent­ing a week of tes­ti­mo­ny and evi­dence in sup­port of his inno­cence claims, while the state con­tin­ued to assert Reed’s guilt. Langley repeat­ed­ly found tes­ti­mo­ny sup­port­ing Reed’s inno­cence to be ​“uncred­i­ble,” assert­ing that many of the wit­ness­es who tes­ti­fied had ​“wait­ed decades to bring forth [their] ​‘rec­ol­lec­tion.’” During the hear­ing, Andrew MacRae, one of Reed’s pro bono lawyers, argued “[t]hese peo­ple didn’t come for­ward, we found them.” Reed’s pri­or court-appoint­ed coun­sel had nev­er inves­ti­gat­ed the issues to look for the wit­ness­es, MacRae said. 

Langley cred­it­ed Fennell’s expla­na­tions about why he cleaned out his bank account the morn­ing of the mur­der, why he failed a poly­graph test about the mur­der, the nature of his rela­tion­ship with Stites, and whether he had killed her. Langley also accept­ed Fennell’s ver­sion of events each time his tes­ti­mo­ny con­flict­ed with that of oth­er wit­ness­es. While Reed’s lawyers pre­sent­ed evi­dence that Fennell had abused Stites and threat­ened to kill her if she cheat­ed on him, Langley cred­it­ed Fennell’s tes­ti­mo­ny that he and Stites had a hap­py rela­tion­ship. Langley dis­count­ed the mul­ti­ple wit­ness­es who tes­ti­fied to hav­ing seen or heard evi­dence that Fennell was abu­sive toward Stites, dis­miss­ing it as hearsay or say­ing that the pas­sage of time between the events and the wit­ness­es’ deci­sions to come for­ward made it uncred­i­ble. Langley also reject­ed the tes­ti­mo­ny of two men who said Fennell had con­fessed to Stites’ mur­der while serv­ing time in prison for an unre­lat­ed crime, say­ing each was ​“not a cred­i­ble or reli­able wit­ness, and his asser­tion that Fennell con­fessed to the mur­der of Stites is not cred­i­ble or reliable.”

Ultimately, Langley found that Reed ​“has not proven by clear and con­vinc­ing evi­dence that no rea­son­able juror would have con­vict­ed him of cap­i­tal mur­der” and ​“has not proven by clear and con­vinc­ing evi­dence that he is actually innocent.”

Reacting to the tri­al court’s rec­om­men­da­tion, Reed’s coun­sel from the Innocence Project, Jane Pucher, said, ​“We look for­ward to pre­sent­ing Mr. Reed’s case to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. If a new jury heard the over­whelm­ing evi­dence of Rodney Reed’s inno­cence, it would have reasonable doubts.” 

Puchar not­ed the racial bias in the case, as well as the unre­li­a­bil­i­ty of the evi­dence against Reed. ​“Convicted by an all-white jury, Mr. Reed has spent 23 years on death row for a crime he did not com­mit. Many high­ly cred­i­ble wit­ness­es tes­ti­fied at the evi­den­tiary hear­ing that Mr. Reed and Stacey Stites knew each oth­er and were inti­mate­ly involved. Many cred­i­ble wit­ness­es also tes­ti­fied that Ms. Stites’s fiancé, Jimmy Fennell, was vio­lent and con­trol­ling and had threat­ened to hurt her if he dis­cov­ered she was unfaith­ful. Nationally rec­og­nized experts have com­plete­ly debunked the foren­sic case against Mr. Reed and even the State’s pathol­o­gy expert has agreed that cen­tral points at tri­al were false. We hope the Court of Criminal Appeals rec­og­nizes that he should be giv­en a new trial.”