A woman has been cleared of murder after spending 35 years in jail as new tests found a different inmate's DNA on the evidence. Cathy Woods, 64, was 29 when she was convicted of stabbing 19-year-old nursing student Michelle Mitchell to death on the edge of the University of Nevada campus in 1976. But in September a judge threw out the case - and on Friday ruled that there will not be a retrial as planned. Instead, prosecutors are now investigating attempted murderer Rodney Halbower as a suspect in the case. Release: Cathy Woods, 64, will not face a retrial in the 1976 murder case of college student Michele Mitchell, whom she was accused of stabbing to death. She is pictured in court in September after being absolved . New evidence: Tests revealed Woods' DNA is not on the evidence from Mitchell's (right) death scene . Halbower, 66, is serving a 30-year term for attempted murder in Oregon, and has since been charged with murdering two teenage girls in California. When Woods was absolved of murder in September 2014, Washoe District Judge Patrick Flanagan ordered the 64-year-old Woods to appear at a retrial July 13. On Friday Washoe County District Attorney Chris Hicks told a news conference that he's filing a motion to dismiss the case. 'It is our belief that the newly discovered DNA evidence and the continued investigation of this case exonerate Cathy Woods of the murder of Michelle Mitchell,' Hicks said. Woods was at the Southern California home of her brother and his wife when the decision was announced. They have been taking care of Woods since her conviction was tossed and she was released from prison on bail in September. New suspect: Rodney L Halbower, an inmate in an Oregon penitentiary, recently submitted DNA evidence which now connects him to a cigarette butt found on Mitchell's dead body . Paula Baxter (left), 17, was abducted February 4, 1976, stabbed to death and had her head bashed in; Carol Lee Booth (right), a 26-year-old housewife, was discovered in a shallow grave . Innocent girls: Veronica Cascio, 18, was snatched off the street while walking to a bus stop (left); Tanya Blackwell, 14, went missing while walking from her home, and her decomposed remains were discovered only six months later . 'She'll be happy. She's phoned a couple of times a day wanting to know if she's going to be prosecuted,' said her public defender, Maizie Pusich. 'She's going to be very excited to know she'll be able to stay at home.' Neither Pusich nor Hicks faulted earlier prosecutors, police and juries for their roles in Woods' convictions. 'Certainly, I wish they had DNA evidence back then, but they didn't,' Pusich said. 'They just didn't have the evidence.' Pusich and the FBI say DNA found on a Marlboro cigarette butt at the Reno crime scene suggests the real killer is a former Oregon inmate recently charged in the deaths of two women who were among five victims in the 'Gypsy Hill' murders near San Francisco about the same time Mitchell's throat was slashed. Woods was convicted in 1980 and again five years later. The convictions were based largely on the confession she made in 1979 at the psychiatric hospital in Shreveport, Louisiana, where her mother committed her months earlier. Scene: Above, the house in Reno where Michell's body was found in 1976. The 19-year-old's throat was slashed shortly after her car broke down near the University of Nevada campus . Justice: Halbower was sent to prison not long after Mitchell's murder, the the rape of a blackjack dealer just a few blocks from where the nursing student's body was found . Prosecutors at those trials argued that only Mitchell's killer could have known the information Woods provided to police in her confession. The Nevada Supreme Court overturned the initial conviction based partly on the trial judge's refusal to allow defense attorneys to present evidence that Woods could have learned everything she told investigators from newspaper accounts. Nevertheless, Woods' lawyers were unable to persuade the jury in the second trial to disregard her earlier confession, Pusich said. Woods doesn't remember acknowledging the killing while hospitalized in March 1979, Pusich said. Previously, Pusich told The Associated Press that Woods confession was given in an effort to get a private room. Shortly after being told she wasn't dangerous enough to qualify for a private room, Woods claimed 'she had killed a woman in Reno,' Pusich said. Woods remains under treatment in Southern California, Pusich said, and is 'doing well.' Rodney Halbower, 66, a native of Muskegon Heights, Michigan, was serving a 30-year sentence for attempted murder in Oregon when he was extradited to San Mateo County in California, and charged in January with murder in the 1976 deaths of Paula Louise Baxter, 17, and Veronica 'Ronnie' Anne Cascio, 18, near Pacifica. The FBI announced two days before Woods' Nevada conviction was vacated that Halbower was a person of interest in the Gypsy Hill murders. Halbower had been arrested for the rape of a 33-year-old woman in Reno in November 1975. He was released on bail and barely a month later, the Gypsy Hill murders began in California. Cascio's body was found Jan. 8, 1976, and Baxter's on Feb. 4. Mitchell was killed Feb. 24. Hicks said Halbower is a suspect in the Nevada murder. His DNA was obtained in 2013 when he was sent to Oregon. 'I would love to bring her (Mitchell's) murderer to justice and we'll do our best,' Hicks said.
Cathy Woods, 64, was absolved of murder in September 2014 . On Friday, judge ruled that she will not be re-tried in the case . She was jailed in 1980 for fatal stabbing of Michelle Mitchell, 19, in Nevada . New tests found a different inmate's DNA on the evidence .