Situation of the 10/21/99

Odell BARNES, a 31 year old black American, was sentenced to death, on 25th May 1991, for the murder of his friend, Helen BASS, killed in her house by a shot into her head, after being beaten and stabbed with a kitchen knife, in the night of 29th to 30th November 1989, in Wichita (Texas).
Although he kept claiming his innocence, Odell BARNES has now been on death row in Huntsville jail, Texas for 9 years. All his respective recourses were rejected. The last filed appeal will be examined by the Supreme Court of the United States, early October 1999. If that appeal is also rejected, a date for his execution will be fixed for 90 days later.
However, not only was Odell BARNES condemned at the end of a hasty prosecution (botched investigation with neither calling of several key witnesses, nor indispensable court-ordered appraisals, state-designated lawyer who admitted incompetence, a hand-picked jury and both judge and prosecutor elected by an anti-abolition population) which should be enough in itself to justify cancellation of the sentence and a new trial; but on top of this his guilt was not proved or demonstrated.
None of the 5 elements held against him was conclusive :

1. 1. He was arrested on the basis of one and only testimony of a person asserting having seen him in front of the house of the victim, on that evening. But that visual witness pretended having recognised BARNES at 10.30 p.m. when it was established that Mrs. BASS had not left her work until 11.14 p.m. and had arrived home between 11.20 and 11.30 p.m.
   Moreover, the witness admitted having recognised the accused even though he was about 40 yards away from him, in the middle of the night, in an ill-lit street, wearing tinted glasses and hardly knowing BARNES. On the other hand, the witness initially asserted that he had been alone in his car, although his own sister has later declared that she was with him in the vehicle that night and that she thought that the person she had seen was BARNES without however being able to formerly identify him and that her brother had told her that it was not BARNES.
   
   
2. Policemen noticed the presence of numerous blood splashes widely spread around the room where the victim had been discovered, whereas only 2 tiny blood stains were spotted on Odell BARNES' clothes, of the same blood group of that of Mrs. BASS and alike 50% of the black American population. Nevertheless this fact is incompatible with the presence of Odell BARNES on the scene of the crime, as, in this case, his clothes would have been covered with the victim's blood to a much greater extent. (Recent investigation has shown the blood stains found on Odell's clothes to have contained the same chemical used in laboratories as an anti-coagulant. This proves that the blood had indeed been planted later by police officers).
   
   
3. Odell BARNES' fingerprint was found on a lamp in the house of the victim. But it was confirmed that BARNES had been several times to Mrs. BASS' who was his mistress, a point which could perfectly explain the fingerprint on the lamp, which, according to the victim's son, had been in his mother's house for at least 5 years. No other fingerprint of Odell BARNES was found, whereas several fingerprints from other non-identified people were taken.
   
   
4. On the other hand, the investigators have established that one door of the victim's house was kicked in and held a fingerprint of a shoe susceptible to belong to Odell BARNES. The expert, however, who examined the door and the shoes of the accused, has concluded that thousands of shoes were susceptible to have made such a fingerprint.
   
   
5. Lastly, 2 witnesses claimed to have seen Odell BARNES in possession of the crime weapon, shortly after., Investigation proved however, that one of these "witnesses" had himself sold the gun to the other and several witnesses had seen both of them the night of the crime, covered with blood and in possession of the gun. On top of this, one witness declared having seen one of these people, near Mrs. BASS house, at the time of these events.