Rodney Reed: ‘Innocent man’ on death row due to be executed in days despite appeals to save him
A death row inmate is due to be executed within days despite new evidence suggesting he could be innocent.
Rodney Reed has been on death row in Texas for the last 21 years after he was convicted of the 1996 rape and murder of 19-year-old Stacey Stites.
The 51-year-old has always maintained his innocence but is scheduled to be executed on 20 November.
However the Innocence Project, a non-profit legal organisation that helps exonerate the wrongfully convicted, has compiled new forensic evidence and DNA samples which claim to show no signs of Reed having been at the murder scene.
Reed’s family and legal team claim he is innocent and that Ms Stites’ then-fiancé Jimmy Fennell, a former police officer and initially a person of interest in the murder case, may have been involved.
Fennell has long denied any involvement in the teenager’s murder, but he was convicted of the abduction and rape of another woman after her death and spent time in prison.
According to an affidavit submitted by Arthur Snow, who knew Fennell in prison, Fennell admitted that he had killed Ms Stites for cheating on him.
An affidavit from a former friend of both Fennell and Ms Stites says that before Ms Stites’ death Fennell had told his friend that he believed Ms Stites was “f****** a n*****.”
Another witness claims to remember Fennell saying he would murder Ms Stites if he ever caught her “messing around” on him.
The murder weapon was also allegedly never tested for DNA and three expert witnesses who testified during Reed’s initial trial have since said they made errors in their analyses.
Fennell’s lawyer, Robert Phillips, said his client had converted to Christianity since leaving prison and was helping people with drug addictions.
He added that Snow was a career criminal whose claim was not credible or in the “world of reality”.
There have been growing calls for Texas governor Greg Abbott to stay Reed’s execution.
His supporters include celebrities Rihanna and Kim Kardashian West, who tweeted the governor saying there was “substantial evidence that would exonerate” Reed, adding: “I urge you to do the right thing.”
More than 160,000 people have signed a Change.org petition asking for a stay in execution.
And Reed’s family and supporters rallied outside of the capitol building in Austin, Texas, over the weekend calling for a new trial.
The death row inmate’s brother, Rodrick Reed, told CBS Austin: “We’re just asking for what’s right.
“We’re just asking for what’s fair, and that’s all we want – so our family can be whole again.”
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