Death row inmate Rodney Reed made an appeal for a new trial Wednesday, 10 years after a Bastrop County jury found him guilty of murder in the death of Stacey Stites, 19.

She was strangled to death in 1996.

Reed's supporters believe the forensic evidence that helped send him to prison was incorrect and misleading. But prosecutors say there's no evidence that can prove Reed is innocent.

Debra Oliver believes Reed took her sister's life and says the thought of going through another trial breaks her heart.

"This is very difficult," she said. "Every time we have to see this, we relive it, and so it's been very difficult especially for my mother."

For more than a decade, Sandra Reed has fought to have her son set free, so he can come home.

"I understand her feelings, that's the way she feels that's the way she feels, I can't, but I know the way I feel, and my son is innocent," Reed said. "We're still hoping and praying the right decision be made."

During Wednesday's arguments, attorneys for Reed told Texas Court of Criminal Appeals judges that evidence was not given to Reed's original lawyers during the trial -- evidence that pointed to another man in Stites' life -- her fiance Jimmy Fennell.

That evidence included beer cans at the murder site containing DNA evidence from Fennell and his best friend and a witness statement alleging Fennell and Stites were together the morning she was murdered.

"I believe if a new trial was granted, on this particular case Mr. Reed's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt could not be established and he would go free," said Morris Overstreet, Reed's attorney.

Overstreet says his client is holding up well and is confident justice will be done.

"He's encouraged with the level of this representation and he's encouraged that he'll be found innocent of these charges," he said.

At the time of his trial Reed's attorneys claimed the real killer was Stites' fiance -- Jimmy Fennell, Jr. -- who was a Giddings police officer at the time. Fennell was described as "an obsessive boyfriend with a violent temper" and who had made comments that he would strangle his girlfriend if he ever caught her cheating on him. Investigators ruled him out as a suspect.

In January, Jimmy Fennell resigned from the Georgetown Police Department after he was indicted for sexual assault. A woman who was in his custody claims he attacked her. That case is still on-going.