Judge Rules Against David Leonard Wood’s Petition

on August 21, 2011 in Forensics, Serial Killers by Brian Combs

Tags: David Leonard Wood

David Leonard Wood has lost an appeal to have his conviction over-turned by an expert review of the DNA evidence of his trial. Judge Bert Richardson ruled:

The court finds that the results of the DNA analysis do not establish that, had the results been available during the trial of offense, it is reasonably probable that (Wood) would not have been convicted.

In short, prosecutors did not rely on DNA evidence in the trial.

Wood was granted a stay of execution two years ago, one day before he was set to be executed.

He still has a petition pending that claims he is mentally retarded and therefore exempt from the death penalty. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that it is unconstitutional to execute mentally retarded offenders.

A hearing on this petition remains to be set. Given that court records show that Wood has held a drivers license, handled his own divorce, and attended college for two years, this is not likely to go very far.