Innocent Woman Freed From Prison

.c The Associated Press
January, 1998

 By PAULINE ARRILLAGA

BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) - For nine years, Susie Mowbray was locked behind bars
for the murder of her husband, all the while protesting he killed himself
while he lay next to her in bed. A jury believed her and has set her free.

``Thank God it's over,'' a tearful Susie Mowbray said after she was acquitted
Friday of killing Bill Mowbray in 1987. ``We have been living with this burden
and this hell for 10 years.''

The verdict was returned after two days of deliberations. As the judge read
the decision, Mrs. Mowbray gasped as several observers in the standing-room-
only courtroom applauded.

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The question of whether Mowbray's death was murder or suicide rested largely
on the testimony of experts who looked at the pattern of blood spatters.

She was convicted in 1988 and sentenced to life in prison, but she was
released after serving nine years when an appeals court ruled prosecutors
suppressed a blood expert's report that contradicted their homicide theory.

The blood expert took the stand Wednesday and testified that the lack of blood
on the sleeve of Mrs. Mowbray's nightgown indicates she did not kill her
husband. Dr. Herbert MacDonell told jurors he believed it was more likely that
Mowbray committed suicide.

Cameron County law enforcement officials' mishandling of evidence was the
deciding factor in the retrial, jury foreman Edward Saldivar said.

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