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CCA Reverses Two Death Sentences Over Flawed Jury Instructions

By Steve Hall

"2 condemned Texas killers win new punishment trial," is the title of the AP report by Michael Graczyk, via the Houston Chronicle.Two convicted killers who have been on death row for 20 years in Texas had their sentences thrown out Wednesday by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, but three other inmates had their death sentences upheld. The state's highest criminal court ruled that jurors who convicted Roy Gene Smith were wrongly kept from hearing evidence about his growing up in a crime-ridden Houston neighborhood. Smith was convicted for a 1988 slaying, and the court said he must be sentenced again in Harris County court.The court also determined that David Lewis, convicted of killing a woman during a burglary in 1986, should have been able to tell jurors that his eyes were damaged at birth and he began using drugs and alcohol with his abusive mother when he was 13...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on April 29, 2010 (boomark / email).