A three-judge panel granted Larry Ray Swearingen a stay of execution one day before he was scheduled to die by lethal injection for the 1998 murder of 19-year-old Montgomery College student Melissa Trotter. Swearingen maintained his innocence from the beginning and his appellate attorneys have filed numerous appeals based on forensic evidence that suggests Swearingen was actually locked up in jail on an unrelated charge when Trotter’s body was left in the Sam Houston National Forest. U.S. Court of Appeals 5th Circuit Judge Jacques L. Wiener Jr. writes there’s a very real possibility the lower court to which Swearingen’s case was returned “could view the newly discovered medical expert reports as clear and convincing evidence that the victim in this case could not possibly have been killed by the defendant.”
Swearingen’s attorney, James Rytting, has presented evidence from several forensic scientists and physicians, including the former Harris County medical examiner whose original testimony helped convict him, who all agree that Trotter’s body was left in the woods well after Swearingen’s arrest.
Excerpted from Chron.com.
