Pulse Radio Network News reports that TEXAS EXECUTED INNOCENT MAN IN 1989: A report out Tuesday (May 15th) from Columbia School of Law professor James Liebman and five of his students says that a 27-year-old man executed in Texas in 1989 named Carlos DeLuna was innocent of murder. They found that, quote, “numerous missteps, missed clues and missed opportunities” led to the conviction of DeLuna for murder, despite evidence that he was innocent and that the real killer was another man, Carlos Hernandez, who looked very much like him. A woman named Wanda Lopez was stabbed to death in a Corpus Christi gas station in the 1983 crime. DeLuna was arrested not far from the gas station and was identified by only one eyewitness who saw a Hispanic man running away. DeLuna said he was innocent, but that he knew who killed Lopez, having seen Hernandez enter the gas station. Additionally, he was caught in a different area from where the killer had been seen running, his clothes were different, and has was clean-shaven when the murderer had been reported as having a moustache. However, he was convicted anyway and executed six years later. Hernandez, who was later jailed for killing another woman with the same knife, repeatedly admitted to killing Lopez until he died behind bars.
