TX Observer: “After years studying errors in death penalty cases, Columbia University law professor James Liebman wondered whether he could prove someone had been executed for a crime they didn’t commit. To test the theory, Liebman turned to Texas, the epicenter of the modern death penalty. In 2004, he and a team of students stumbled upon the case of Carlos DeLuna, who was sentenced to death in 1983 for the murder of a young gas station attendant named Wanda Lopez in Corpus Christi. From the time of his trial to his execution in 1989, DeLuna professed his innocence and claimed another Carlos, Carlos Hernandez, killed Lopez. Prosecutors mocked DeLuna’s defense, calling Hernandez a “phantom” and claiming police had searched for but couldn’t find the other Carlos.
In 2012, Liebman and his team of students published a book meticulously detailing the cascade of errors that led to DeLuna’s conviction and death sentence…The Phantom, a documentary that opens in theaters this weekend, features the work of Liebman’s team and builds on it, presenting new interviews and evidence that further undermines DeLuna’s conviction and bolsters the disturbingly convincing case that Texas executed the wrong Carlos. The documentary comes at a time of growing unease about capital punishment in Texas and across the country. The Observer spoke with Liebman about DeLuna’s case, the documentary, and the fallability of the death penalty:”