From his small cell on California’s death row, Scott Pinholster swore he could prove his innocence. “He’s liable to get off then?”Pinholster is one of 744 people awaiting execution in California — the largest death row population in the country. California law requires that courts keep evidence until after a death row inmate is executed or dies behind bars — a safeguard put in place to preserve evidence for future testing. Mary Hearn, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Superior Court, said the court’s procedure for destroying evidence, which was updated last year, now requires that staff first contact California’s Supreme Court to confirm a death row inmate has died. Hearn said Pinholster, 58, is the only known example of evidence destruction in a case of a living death row inmate convicted in L.A. County.

Source: Los Angeles Times December 17, 2017 10:52 UTC