Cigarette DNA Frees Woman Over 1976 Killing

A woman who has spent 30 years in custody for a killing will be released from prison and granted a new trial based on recently discovered DNA evidence.

Cathy Woods, 64, was convicted of the 1976 killing 19-year-old Michelle Mitchell on the campus of the University of Nevada, Reno.

The victim was found with her throat slashed in a garage across from the university car park.

Her lawyer says new genetic evidence on a cigarette butt ties the killing to a man currently serving time for an unrelated case.

Victim Michelle Mitchell was found with her throat slashed

The cigarette butt was collected in the car park, and the lawyer says it matches that of the inmate, Rodney L Halbower, 66.

Washoe District Judge Patrick Flanagan ordered a retrial and set the date for July 13, 2015.

The judge also ordered Woods to be released.

Rodney L Halbower is being held in Oregon over an unrelated case

"We are delighted that Cathy gets to go home and we get to try to prove to the rest of the world she was innocent all along," lawyer Maizie Pusich said after the hearing.

"No DNA found at the Michelle Mitchell crime scene belongs to Cathy Woods."

The genetic material has also linked Halbower to at least two of five unsolved killings in the San Francisco Bay Area known as the Gypsy Hill murders, which are currently being probed by an FBI task force.

While under psychiatric care at Louisiana State University Medical Center, Woods acknowledged killing Mitchell but later recanted.

Her final conviction in the case was in 1985.

Her lawyer said Woods does not remember acknowledging the killing after she was committed to the mental hospital by her mother for reasons unrelated to any crime.

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