@southfisherman,
it probably has more to do with the association of red with evil (in western culture anyway), the story "The Scarlet Letter" is about a woman who commits adultery and has a scarlet (red) letter "A" sewn on her blouse for all to see
as for the apple in the bible, i'm not sure it's ever said to be an apple, it's "the fruit of the tree of knowledge", not sure when an apple was first said to be the fruit