A death row inmate backed by Kim Kardashian says new evidence should set him free. Prosecutors say his lawyers have conducted a 'campaign of misinformation.'
- Julius Jones was sentenced to die for the 1999 shooting death of Paul Howell in Oklahoma.
- He has maintained his innocence and is seeking a sentence commutation.
- Oklahoma's Pardon and Parole Board is reviewing his application next week.
An inmate on death row in Oklahoma who has drawn national attention for his two-decade old case is having his commutation application reviewed by the state's Pardon and Parole Board on Monday, but prosecutors on Wednesday called for his filing to be rejected, accusing his lawyers of conducting a "campaign of misinformation."
Julius Jones, 40, has spent 19 years on death row after being convicted and sentenced to die for the 1999 shooting death of Paul Howell, a businessman from Edmond, Oklahoma.
Prosecutors said at the time that Jones robbed Howell of his SUV in his parents' driveway, as he returned from back-to-school shopping with his two daughters. During the robbery, Howell was shot once in the head.
Jones, who was a 19-year-old University of Oklahoma student at the time of the shooting, has maintained his innocence over the last two decades, and his family has said he was at home eating dinner at the time of the murder, according to the City Sentinel.
Celebrities including Kim Kardashian West, NBA players Russell Westbrook and Trae Young, and NFL player Baker Mayfield have voiced support for Jones in recent months, and Kardashian West even visited him in jail last year.
As the Pardon and Parole Board review approaches, Jones' lawyer and Oklahoma County District Attorney David Prater have released conflicting statements about Jones' request for commutation.
Jones' lawyers released a video and letter on Monday in which they said a man named Roderick Wesley, who served time with Jones' co-defendant Christopher Jordan, said Jordan told him he actually killed Howell and framed Jones.
Wesley is the third person to say Jordan confessed to killing Howell while behind bars, according to the City-Sentinel.
Jones' lawyers have also said that DNA found on a bandana at the scene of Howell's murder didn't constitute a match, per legal standards.
But in his own 15-page letter to the state's Pardon and Parole Board, Prater urged the board to reject Jones' request for commutation hearing.
"To this day, Jones has not expressed an ounce of remorse for his callous actions," Prater wrote in the letter seen by the Associated Press. "Instead, he continues to victimize the Howell family by fueling a media circus with outright lies and by making a farce of this clemency process."
He also accused Jones' legal team of engaging in a "coordinated and alarmingly successful campaign of misinformation, spurred by media frenzy, which is specifically targeted to manipulate and mislead the public through dissemination of half-truths and, frequently, outright lies."
Dale Baich, one of Julius Jones' attorneys, criticized Prater's letter in a statement sent to Insider.
He said Prater's letter "recycles the stale arguments the state made at trial nearly 20 years ago."
"The district attorney failed to address the new evidence we put forward that supports Julius' application to have his death sentence commuted to time served," he added. "We now have multiple letters, videos and sworn affidavits of people who say that Christopher Jordan admitted to killing Mr. Howell and to framing Julius. No reasonable person could see this new evidence and conclude that Julius is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt."
Jones has exhausted all of his appeals during his time in prison, but Oklahoma has yet to set a date for his execution, because the state's lethal-injection protocols are being challenged in federal court, the Associated Press reported.
Baich questioned how Oklahoma can "justify keeping [Jones] behind bars" in his statement to Insider.
"Every day this question goes unanswered is a miscarriage of justice," he said.