the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in New Orleans has upheld...

the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in New Orleans has upheld a lower court ruling granting a new trial to a man sentenced to death in a murder-for-hire plot. Howard Paul Guidry, 28, was put on death row in 1997 for the Nov. 9, 1994 killing of Farah Fratta, 34.
The Court upheld a ruling made Sept. 26, 2003, by U.S District Judge Vanessa Gilmore that Guidry was denied access to an attorney and that inadmissible evidence was allowed to be used against him during his trial. The killing was plotted by the victim's husband, former Missouri City police Officer Robert Fratta, 47, who hired Joseph Andrew Prystash to carry it out. Prystash, 48, hired Guidry.
Fratta and Prystash also were convicted of capital murder and are on death row. Gilmore ruled that a Harris County sheriff's investigator had ignored Guidry's request to see his attorney, then lied to him, telling him that his lawyer had given him permission to speak with police.
Guidry eventually confessed. The judge also found that the trial court should not have allowed the hearsay testimony of Prystash's girlfriend, Mary Gipp, who testified that Prystash had told her he paid Guidry $1,000 to assist in the killing and that Guidry fired the fatal bullets.
Harris County prosecutors appealed Gilmore's ruling. The state can ask for a rehearing on the matter with the full 5th Circuit, can appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, can retry Guidry or drop the charges.