Did Texas execute an innocent man?

[KSigkid]

For people who want to learn more about the story, I believe The New Yorker published an extensive article on the subject. It goes into a lot of detail on how the expert came to his opinion, and why the process may have been flawed.

Originally Posted by Kevin

Won't have any effect. My father did a murder case a while back. Got the conviction reversed on appeal and subsequently got an acquittal on the retrial.

I'm against the death penalty for a variety of reasons. Mostly though, because it's not handed out on what I perceive to be an equal or fair basis, i.e., more likely to be given to racial minorities and people of lower socio-economic status.

I look at it like this -- if they couldn't put Terry Nichols to death [co-conspirator for the OKC bombing], then pretty much no one else matches up. Not even close.

Agreed - I'm also against the death penalty, but I don't see this story making any difference in the way it's administered.

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

Am I missing something in the article?

I don't see anything that actually proves the guy's innocence, just something that suggests that forensic evidence might have been more faulty than previously thought.
It may create doubt for us, but maybe less so for the jury, since we don't really know why they convicted. We also don't know, based on anything we read here, I don't think, that the guy didn't start the fire and leave it to burn, even if he didn't use an accelerant.

I have mixed feeling about the death penalty, but "proving innocence" after conviction seems kind of complicated. I don't have any sense what other evidence other than the forensics were part of the prosecution here. What motive do people ever have to kill their kids?

But that's the point - if the reliability of the evidence creates a greater doubt as to the defendant's guilt, that's a big deal. Remember too, it's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and it's the prosecution's burden to prove that (not the defendant's burden to refute it). If the scientific evidence was faulty, then that's a big problem....big enough to throw the whole result into question.

That said, again, I agree with Kevin that this case isn't going to make any difference.