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    Do you know, really know, what life is like on Death Row in Texas?
          I do not believe you have the capacity to fathom the feeling of
        knowing you could be murdered for a crime you did not commit.

                                My name Is Paul Colella.
            I am innocent on death row in Livingston Texas.

I have been here since 1992. My case is currently going back to court
on appeal so I am not allowed to discuss any details of the case.
The article from the newspaper on this web page is about three
Judges on the Court ofCriminal appeals who believe I am innocent.

  AUSTIN (AP) - The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has upheld the death sentence of an Cameron County man convicted of killing two man he thought raped his wife in 1991.

But at least two judges said Wednesday they believed the wrong man has been sentenced to die.

Paul Richard Colella, 27, was convicted in September 1992 for shooting David Taylor and Michael Lavexphere on Sept. 12., 1991.

Six judges affirmed the conviction. But Judge Charles Baird wrote in a dissenting opinion, with Judge Morris Overstreet concurring, that an accomplice was the more likely killer.

A roller coaster series of events found Colella and Anthony "Red" Wilson helping the victims free a truck from the sand on South Padre Island and partying with them on the beach. According to court records, Colella later found the victims asleep in their white pickup and shot them.

"The evidence in this record suggest that Red, not appellant committed the murders." Baird wrote in his opinion. "I would reverse the judgment of the trial court and order a acquittal."

According to the majority opinion, Colellas wife, Brenda Bowling, partied with the group on the beach, argued  with her husband about his drinking and then left the beach. The victims later found her hitchhiking and picked her up.

Ms. Bowling told her husband that the victims had raped her, but Rick Taylor, brother of one of the victims who was also with the slain men, denied the charge, the opinion said.

Ms. Bowling did not want to go to the police, because there was a warrant out for her arrest in Indiana. The couple had recently moved to South Texas from Terre Haute, Ind., the opinion said.

After shooting the men, Colella drove the pickup into the bay and threw the gun in the ocean, court records said. He and Ms. Bowling then fled to Indiana, where Colella was later arrested.

Baird`s dissent, however, suggested that Wilson`s testimony against Colella did not jibe with the physical evidence and that none of the evidence served to connect the condemned man to the killings.

"For example, Wilson said Colella shot one of the victims in the bed of the pickup and then walked to the driver`s side to shoot the second. During the trial, however, a medical examiner said the victims were shot from the passenger side of the vehicle," Baird said.

Baird also questioned whether Colella could have committed the crimes at 2. am, Sept. 12, 1991, with enough time to travel from South Padre Island to Victoria where he bought a bus ticket at 6am.

Also, he suggested the local authorities had botched the initial investigation by neglecting to secure the crime scene, among other things.