Nevada considering DNA testing procedures for death row inmates

An Assembly panel was urged Monday to back a plan that ensures Nevada's death row inmates can petition for DNA testing of any existing evidence not previously tested.

The Judiciary Committee was told AB16 would give condemned convicts the right to petition the courts to order the testing, but also gives judges discretion to decide whether it's necessary.

The court would only order such tests if there's a "reasonable probability" that the petitioner wouldn't have been prosecuted or convicted if the DNA evidence had been tested earlier and didn't connect the person with the crime.

Michael Pescetta, a federal public defender specializing in the death penalty, said AB16 would apply to a limited number of inmates already under the sentence of death.

There doesn't appear to be much need for the legislation in future capital cases. Pescetta said that when DNA evidence exists now, that evidence is usually tested prior to trial.

Pescetta also said that of the 30 death row cases he's involved in -- out of 85 people on Nevada's death row -- DNA testing has been completed.

But Pescetta said the bill is important because it would guarantee genetic materials tests to death row inmates who may have exhausted all of their other appeal options.

"It's a good thing to have because you never know," Pescetta said after the hearing. "For capital cases, it's a good thing to have in our pocket. This is definitely worthwhile."

"The idea of this bill is to provide a fairly simple procedure for capital cases, for cases where it's discovered at some point that there is evidence available that people thought was gone," he said. "Sometimes it might be well into the case before it's found."

The proposal came out of the Legislature's interim committee to study the death penalty. That panel came up with 17 recommendations, including a ban on the execution of the mentally retarded and abolition of three-judge sentencing panels, in line with recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings.