Today's report comes as Texas prepares to execute Frances Newton this Wednesday, despite serious doubts about the evidence in her case. The state's case against Newton, who has maintained her innocence from the beginning, was based almost entirely on ballistics evidence processed at Houston's now-discredited crime lab, which has been under widespread investigation since August when police found 280 boxes of mislabeled and improperly stored evidence from 8,000 cases dating back more than a decade. Newton's court-appointed attorney also failed to interview any witnesses in preparation for the trial.

Among the key findings of the report:

* Women on Death Row often had ineffective legal counsel and were victims of misconduct by prosecutors or law enforcement.
* More than half of the women have suffered regular, ongoing physical abuse by family members or spouses.
* Half of the women on Death Row acted with at least one other person, but in most of those cases, the co-defendant received a sentence other than death-even in cases where they appeared to be equally culpable.
* Many women on Death Row live in almost complete isolation, which puts them at a serious risk of developing mental illness, or exacerbating existing mental illness.
* A third of the women surveyed said that corrections officers watch them when they use the toilet, shower or change clothes.