The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled for a Texas death row inmate who is seeking DNA testing to show he should be ineligible for execution.

The 6-3 decision in favor of Ruben Gutierrez gives him a potential path to have evidence tested that his lawyers say would help prove he was not responsible for the fatal stabbing of an 85-year-old woman during a home robbery decades ago.

His lawyers have said there was no physical or forensic evidence connecting him to the killing and that he was not a major participant in the crime. Two others also were charged in the case.

Gutierrez’s lawyers argued that his case was similar to that of Rodney Reed, another longtime death row inmate in Texas who also won a round at the Supreme Court in his fight for DNA testing that he says would show he is innocent of murder.

  • reddig33@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    6-3 decision. I can guess two out of the three who voted to kill him without evidence.

    • Rekhyt@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      I was really curious who the third would be and I didn’t see it in the article, so I found the opinion and here’s the full list:

      • Sotomayor wrote the majority option
      • Barrett wrote a concurring opinion
      • Alito dissented with Gorsuch
      • Thomas separately dissented (and starts the dissent by agreeing with Alito, so he just wanted to be even more of a douche)