Frances Newton faces execution Sept. 14 for the murder of her husband, Adrian Newton, and her children, Alton and Farah Newton in Harris County. Forensics evidence used to convict Newton is highly questionable and a test at the crime scene concluded that the Newton had not fired a weapon the night her husband and children were shot to death. This test, called an atomic absorption test, was conducted just hours after the shootings and found that there was no gunpowder residue present. Newton’s lawyers argue that even if Newton had washed her hands after the crime, it would have been impossible to remove all gunpowder residue.

“There is substantial doubt that Frances Newton committed the crimes for which she has been sentenced to death,” said Diann Rust-Tierney, executive director of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. “No court has considered issues relating to her conviction on its merits, nor were many of them addressed by the jury that convicted Newton.

Rust-Tierney added that Newton’s conviction was based entirely on circumstantial evidence, and that testing of her hands shortly after the murders took place showed she had not fired a weapon.

“Public confidence in the criminal justice system is eroded when sentences are carried out despite doubts about guilt,” she said. “For this reason, we call on the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles and Gov. Rick Perry to commute this sentence.”

Rick Halperin, president of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, an NCADP affiliate, said Newton’s case “embodies the core problems with the death penalty in Texas.”

“She has a strong innocence claim, her trial counsel was egregiously incompetent, and her conviction rested in large part on the results of ballistics testing conducted by the now-discredited Houston Police Department’s crime lab,” Halperin said. “This sentence must not be carried out.”

Newton joins a growing list of people on death row from Harris County who have raised questions about forensic testing used in their convictions. This list includes:

****Nanon Williams. Williams was convicted and sentenced to death despite the fact that a Houston Police Department firearms examiner misidentified the type of gun used in the commission of a murder. Williams did not own the type of gun that was used.

****Johnnie Bernal. A HPD firearms examiner deviated from professional norms of ballistics examination by firing 25 test-fires rather than the customary two or three, and even applied a solution to the barrel of the gun mid-test in an effort to obtain a ballistics match.

****Anibal Rousseau. Rousseau was sentenced to death despite the fact that a file, located by Rousseau’s habeas counsel 12 years after Rousseau arrived on death row, revealed exculpatory ballistics evidence in the possession of HPD and the Harris County district attorney’s office.

Williams and Bernal are no longer on death row because of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling barring the execution of juvenile offenders. They remain incarcerated despite questions surrounding their guilt. Rousseau remains on death row.

NCADP and TCADP are urging people to take action to oppose Newton’s execution by visiting NCADP’s Action Center at:

http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/ncadp/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=1132

NOTE TO REPORTERS, EDITORS AND PRODUCERS:
To receive a copy of Newton’s 54-page clemency application and an accompanying memo prepared by Texas Defender Service, please email David Elliot at delliot@ncadp.org

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