Would Texas execute man innocent of murder? Expert journalist worries answer is yes

David Protess is a journalism professor at Northwestern University, a book author and a freelance magazine writer. He has gained a modicum of well-deserved fame for leading his journalism students in real-world investigations that have freed innocent men from prison while sometimes identifying the actual perpetrators.

Browsers can find out more about the reporting of Protess and his students by going to to their website.

In some cases, Protess and his students collaborate with the Center on Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern University. Directing that center, within the law school, is Rob Warden, who used to publish a crusading magazine called Chicago Lawyer. Warden has written and edited numerous wrongful conviction exposes. He and Protess are co-authors of two books about miscarriages of justice.

Occasionally, Protess and his students investigate cases outside Illinois. The Hank Skinner case in Texas is one of those. Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court halted the scheduled execution of Skinner, a convicted murderer, so the justices could consider whether to order forensic testing of apparently untested evidence that could verify Skinner’s insistence he is innocent.

(“In Justice” published three postings related to the Skinner case earlier this month.)

Protess and his students celebrated the stay of execution granted by the Supreme Court, but understand that is not akin to victory. In correspondence with me, Protess said this about Skinner:

Thanks for commenting on this outrageous case. Here we have a pro-State lab that only tested  evidence placing Skinner at the crime scene (his home), a fact that no one disputes. But no lab has tested evidence that might exclude him as the perpetrator, including the rape kit, two bloody knives, hair found in the female victim’s hand, skin under her fingernail clippings and a blood-stained windbreaker found next to her body that looks strikingly similar to the prime alternative suspect in the case. Can Texas — even Texas — put Skinner to death without testing evidence that almost certainly would prove his innocence (which he has steadfastly professed) or guilt?

Skinner might be a killer. But if the truth is unclear right now to Protess–a genuine expert on investigating wrongful convictions–then the truth ought to be unclear to everybody else without further investigation.