Appeals court rules in favor of death row inmate

HOUSTON — A federal appeals court Tuesday upheld a lower court ruling that gives a new trial to a former suburban Houston public safety officer sentenced to die for masterminding the fatal shooting of his wife.

A federal district court judge last October ruled condemned inmate Robert Fratta's conviction was based on an inadmissible jailhouse confession from the man who allegedly carried out the shooting.

On Tuesday, a panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, saying the confession used against Fratta was "contradictory, inconsistent and self-serving."

"The state's burden was to produce affirmative proof that a murder-for-hire had occurred, and on this point, the admissible evidence was far from conclusive," the court said.

Fratta's wife, Farah, 33, was found dead in the garage of her north Harris County home in November 1994. She'd been shot twice in the head.

Prosecutors said Robert Fratta, now 51, had his wife killed after she filed for divorce. He had tried to collect on her life insurance policy days after her death. Payment for her death was to be $1,000 and a Jeep, prosecutors said.

The man named by authorities as the triggerman, Howard Paul Guidry, was convicted in 1997 and sentenced to death. He was granted a new trial, was tried last year, convicted and sentenced to death a second time. A third defendant, Joseph Prystash, who prosecutors said Fratta enlisted to hire Guidry, also is on death row.

"By the terms of the indictment, the state was required to prove that Fratta employed Prystash or Guidry to kill Farah in exchange for remuneration in the form of money or a car," the 5th Circuit panel wrote Tuesday. "As an initial matter, the admissible evidence connecting Prystash and Guidry to the murder was hardly overwhelming ...

"On the crucial point of whether Fratta had engaged Prystash or Guidry to commit the murder for remuneration, the inadmissible evidence was vital to the state's case."

Neither Prystash nor Guidry testified at Fratta's trial and the appeals court said allegations against Fratta were improperly supported "entirely of hearsay statements" introduced to jurors by a pair of prosecution witnesses, a detective and Prystash's girlfriend.

According to court documents, Fratta made no secret of his bitter feelings toward his estranged wife and often expressed a desire to see her dead. They'd been married nine years and had three children.

Fratta, who worked as a peace officer in Missouri City, southwest of Houston, has long maintained his innocence.

A year ago, he asked Melinda Harmon, the federal judge who eventually ruled in his favor, for guidance on how to drop his appeals and volunteer for execution. In a letter to the judge, he said even though he was innocent, "I would rather be killed than live in this daily torture and torment."

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