A Columbus woman who made national headlines in the 1990s after being exonerated for murder had her story told on CNN’s Headline News channel Sunday.
Headline News aired “Mississippi Mother,” the story of Sabrina Butler’s arrest, conviction and, later, exoneration, of the 1989 death of her infant son. The broadcast was an episode of Headline News’ third season of “Death Row Stories.”
At age 17, Butler was accused of beating and murdering her son, Walter Dean Butler. She was convicted and sentenced to death in 1990.
The Mississippi Supreme Court overturned Butler’s case in the early ’90s. In 1995, Butler was acquitted on a retrial after her attorneys were able to prove the bruising on her infant son’s body had been left by Butler’s and others’ attempts to resuscitate him. They also proved his death had been caused by medical issues.
“Death Row Stories” covers stories about the criminal justice system throughout the United States that “pose hard questions about the U.S. capital punishment system,” according to CNN’s website. It airs Sundays at 7 p.m. Central Time on HNL. Individual episodes can be accessed at HNL On Demand.
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