A Nashville trial judge has denied a Tennessee death-row prisoner’s motion to reopen his case and halt his scheduled April 21, 2022 execution in light of new DNA evidence. In a motion filed April 4, 2022, lawyers for Oscar Smith had argued that evidence from “touch DNA” — a new DNA testing technology — on an awl used in the murder of Smith’s estranged wife and her 2 sons in 19889 “definitively excluded” Smith and suggested that another, unknown male had been involved in the murders. The three were shot and stabbed with a knife and an awl, the only murder weapon recovered from the crime scene. In January 2022, with the agreement of both prosecutors and the defense, the trial court released the awl for testing with the touch DNA technology. “The significance of this result cannot be overstated,” Smith’s lawyers wrote in the motion. “Oscar Smith has, using his new touch DNA technology, demonstrated that he is not the person who used the awl to kill his family.” Davidson County Criminal Co...
Striving for a World without Capital Punishment