Last November, a Bastrop County judge restarted the countdown to Rodney Reed's execution. Now, attorney Andrew McRae wants the Texas Criminal Court of Appeals to stop the clock for good.
"I would hope that the state would want to execute someone only after we are certain that person is guilty,” McRae said.
Reed is set to be executed March 5 for the 1996 death of Stacey Stites in Bastrop, but McRae and an attorney from the Innocence Project says a fresh look at the evidence from two nationally recognized medical examiners calls the case against Reed into doubt.
Attorneys say the medical examiner who performed the first autopsy on Stites also questions his original testimony.
"He has since recanted that testimony, and he has agreed that it is impossible to pinpoint the exact time of death,” McRae said. “He has agreed that the time of death was not 3 a.m. and was likely far before that."
McRae says changing the time of death makes it impossible that Reed killed Stites. Instead, he says the evidence points to Jimmy Fennell Jr., who was engaged to Stites when she was murdered.
At the time, Fennell was a police officer in Giddings.
"Mr. Fennell testified that he thinks she left the house at about 3 a.m., which is medically and scientifically impossible now,” McRae said.
Fennell later worked for the Georgetown Police Department and is currently in prison for raping a woman while on duty.
Last November, Stites' sister says her family was not swayed by arguments from Reed's attorneys.
"The family has never believed that he was not guilty,” her sister, Debra Oliver, said then.
Reed's attorneys filed their appeal under laws passed after Michael Morton was cleared of killing his wife. That law allows attorneys to bring the case back to court if they find new evidence that can overturn the conviction.