Txexecutions.org

Craig Neil Ogan, 47, was executed by lethal injection on 19 November 2002 in Huntsville, Texas for the murder of a police officer.

Craig Ogan had worked as an informant for the federal Drug Enforcement Agency since January 1988. Upon his request, the DEA relocated him from St. Louis to Houston in late 1989 after his identity had been revealed in a court proceeding.

Ogan was under orders to not personally get involved in any drug transactions. He was also prohibited from carrying a weapon. Despite these instructions, Ogan insisted on arming himself and seeking involvement in drug transactions.

On 8 December 1989, Ogan, then 34, called the DEA agent who supervised him and told him that he was in a restaurant where he had just had an armed confrontation over a drug deal that fell through. He said that a man pointed a gun at his head and called him "narc." He said that he feared for his life and asked for an escort from the restaurant.

The agent arranged for two Houston police officers to escort Ogan from the restaurant back to his apartment. Once at the apartment, the officers watched as Ogan packed his belongings, which included a pistol, a sawed-off shotgun, and some knives. They then followed him to a motel. Ogan checked into a room, and the officers left at around 9:00 p.m.

At about 12:30 a.m., Ogan went to the lobby to complain about his telephone charges and the heater in his room. He argued loudly with the clerk and began kicking at a door.

When the clerk called 9-1-1 for assistance, Ogan left. Around this time, Houston police officers Clay Morgan Gainer and James C. Boswell pulled a car into a parking lot across the street from the motel, for a minor traffic violation.

Ogan, then 34, walked over to them and knocked on the passenger window. Officer Boswell, 29, lowered his window and asked Ogan what he wanted. After a heated exchange, Boswell got out of the car. Ogan took Boswell's pistol and shot him once in the head. He ran. Officer Gainer chased Ogan on foot, shot him in the back, and arrested him.

At Ogan's trial, Gainer testified that when Boswell lowered his window and asked Ogan what he wanted, Ogan replied, "DEA dropped me off out here, and I'm cold." Boswell told Ogan that they would help him as soon as they finished with the traffic stop, and to back away from the car.

Boswell then raised his window. Ogan, however, demanded immediate attention. He knocked on Boswell's window again, repeating that he was a DEA informant and that he was cold. Boswell told him, "You need to get out of here if you are not willing to step out of the way and wait. You either need to leave, or you are going to jail."

Ogan persisted with his demands. Boswell got out of the police car. According to Gainer, Boswell removed his sidearm from the holster and held it down against his leg. As he was reaching into the car to unlock the back door, Ogan grabbed Boswell's gun and shot him once in the head. Ogan then said, "Well, [expletive] you then" and ran.

In addition to the above testimony, Darryl O'Leary, one of the two officers who escorted Ogan from the restaurant, testified that Ogan was "extremely excited" when he arrived. O'Leary said that when he told Ogan he could not take him until a backup officer arrived, Ogan became "impatient, hostile, and loud."

Ogan had no prior criminal convictions. He had numerous assault charges that had been filed against him, then dismissed. Sally Webster, a psychologist testifying for the defense, said that Ogan suffered from paranoia and had a passive-aggressive personality, but that these disorders were not mental illnesses and had no bearing on his competency to stand trial.

She described Ogan's mental state on 8 and 9 December as "anxious, agitated, almost hyperactive, very touchy, very worried." Ogan's lawyers called Webster to testify in an attempt to assert his mental state as a mitigating factor in determining his punishment, but the tactic backfired. Instead, prosecutors convinced the jury that Ogan's history of high-strung paranoia made him a future danger to society.

A jury convicted Ogan of capital murder in June 1990 and sentenced him to death. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction and sentence in April 1993. All of his subsequent appeals in state and federal court were denied. In his appeals, Ogan's attorneys claimed that their client suffered from a mental illness and that his trial counsel was incompetent for failing to use that in his defense. Ogan, who had an IQ of 140, had attended college, and spoke several languages, told a reporter, "They're trying to sell me as a nut case. I don't appreciate that."

Ogan had a longstanding interest in espionage and had ambitions of joining the Central Intelligence Agency. In one of his letters from death row, he claimed that he had an appointment for an interview with the CIA the day he killed Officer Boswell. His career as a spy, however, never took off.

At his trial, DEA agents testified that they considered Ogan to be, though a "marginally successful" informant, mostly a comical figure who ducked behind newspapers whenever a stranger entered their office. They derisively called him "special agent double-oh-five" behind his back. They also criticized him for getting involved in a drug deal without their permission, then calling for their assistance when it got him into trouble.

From death row, Ogan wrote letters that were posted on an anti-death-penalty web site. In one of them, he claimed that his execution represented the "premeditated mass murder" of possibly thousands of his potential descendants. He also provided his version of the conversation between himself and Officer Boswell. In Ogan's account, he was extremely polite, courteous to a fault, and non-confrontational.

Boswell and Gainer, on the other hand, were hostile to him without provocation and called him a "[expletive] DEA snitch." Ogan wrote that when he told Boswell, "All right, sir; I was only asking for help," Boswell then threw his door open and burst out of the car "in an insane rage, running/lunging furiously right at me, like a football tackle gone berserk, and clawing frantically at his gun/holster." An anti-death-penalty spokesman who visited Ogan on death row described him as "extremely tense." Ogan's execution was delayed for nearly an hour as the Supreme Court considered late appeals questioning his mental competence.

"In killing me, the people responsible have blood on their hands, because I am not guilty," Ogan said in his lengthy last statement. He described the events of the killing and blamed Boswell. "I acted in self-defense and reflex in the face of a police officer who was out of control," he said.

Man Executed for Killing Officer in 1989

By Mark Passwaters - The Huntsville Item

November 20, 2002

Craig Ogan claimed he was a successful informant for the Drug Enforcement Administration. He also claimed he was a genius. The Harris County District Attorney's Office and 12 jurors said he is nothing but a cop killer. For that reason, he was executed Tuesday evening at the Huntsville "Walls" Unit.

Defiant until the end, Ogan claimed the "real crimes" in his case were "the attempted murder and intimidation of a federal drug informant by Officer James Boswell and Officer Clay Morgan Gaines."

Ogan, who was a DEA informant -- but never hired by the federal government -- shot Boswell on the night of Dec. 8, 1989 after Boswell did not respond to his demands for assistance quickly enough. Even during his final statement, Ogan claimed he was acting in self-defense.

"I acted in self-defense and reflex in the face of a police officer who was out of control," he said. "The people responsible for killing me will have blood on their hands for an unprovoked murder." During his final statement, which lasted several minutes, Ogan repeatedly spoke of "physical evidence" and "possible motives" Boswell might have had to hurt him.

While speaking about Boswell's dealing's with "enemy agents," Ogan suddenly snorted, gasped twice and was silent. At 7:05 p.m., the lethal dose of chemicals had been started. "Very good," commented one unidentified witness.

Ogan was pronounced dead at 7:13 p.m. His execution, which had been scheduled to take place an hour earlier, had been delayed while two final appeals were heard by the U.S. Supreme Court. One of those appeals claimed Ogan -- who boasted of his high IQ -- could not be executed because he was mentally retarded.

Boswell's mother, three brothers and a sister remained silent during Ogan's final statement, but spoke briefly to reporters afterward. "He didn't say anything he hadn't already said," Martha Boswell, the slain officer's mother, said. "It didn't surprise me; I was OK with it." Martha Boswell called Ogan "Jim's judge, jury and executioner, without a second thought." "(Tuesday) is the night justice was finally served, plain and simple," she said. "It's way past time."

Boswell's father Sonny, confined to a wheelchair, waited outside the "Walls" Unit with nearly 80 motorcyclists who came to show their support for the Boswell family. Most of the motorcyclists were members of the Houston Police Department or Harris County Sheriff's Department and included Gainer, Boswell's partner. "It's time. It's just time," Gainer said. "I want justice to be done," Sonny Boswell said as he clutched a picture of his son. "The State of Texas pronounced sentence on him, and I think it should be carried out."

Originally from Missouri, Ogan was described as a "marginally successful" DEA informant who had moved to Houston after his cover had been blown. After he moved to Houston, he ignored warnings from DEA agents to keep a low profile and became known on the city's drug scene. The night of the murder Ogan was moved from his apartment to a motel by DEA agents after a drug dealer put a gun to his head and accused him of being a "DEA snitch."

Ogan became enraged when he discovered the motel lacked heat and long distance telephone service. He went to the motel's office to complain, yelling at the clerk and kicking a door in frustration. When he stormed out of the office, he noticed a police cruiser nearby. The vehicle was driven by Boswell and Gainer.

Ogan walked over to the cruiser and rapped on Boswell's window. When Boswell asked Ogan what he wanted, he said, "DEA dropped me off here, and I'm cold." Since the officers were in the middle of a traffic stop, Gainer later testified, Boswell asked Ogan to step back until they were done. Ogan, making what he describes as a "polite request," knocked on the window a second time and continued to ramble about his DEA work.

Boswell told him again to back away, and when he refused, Boswell said, "You need to get out of here if you're not willing to step out of the way and wait. You either need to leave or you're going to jail." Boswell then got out of the squad car and unlocked the back door of the vehicle. Suddenly, Gainer testified, Ogan grabbed Boswell's gun, shot him once in the head, and fled. Gainer then shot Ogan in the back and arrested him. Boswell was dead before his body hit the ground.

Ogan claimed Boswell was "in an insane rage" when he got out of the car. "I saw his gun clear the holster and/or come into view," he wrote. "Reflex took over ... Then I saw the gun in my hand as the horrible realization crept over me. I had just shot a policeman in the head." Ogan used claims of self-defense during his trial and said he feared for his life when he shot Boswell. A Harris County jury did not buy into Ogan's story, convicting him of capital murder on June 25, 1990, and sentencing him to death four days later.

While incarcerated at the Polunsky Unit in Livingston, Ogan wrote a remarkable, rambling diatribe about his case -- much of which he repeated in his final statement -- and posted it on the Internet. In it, he claimed the state of Texas would commit "premeditated mass murder" by executing him and halting his ability to procreate. "Those future Ogans ... for anyone knows (may) be blessed with the intellect of an Albert Einstein or George Washington Carver," Ogan wrote. "Haven't they a right to life, regardless?"

Houston Cop-Killer Executed

By Allan Turner - Houston Chronicle

November 19, 2002

HUNTSVILLE -- Cop-killer Craig Ogan went to his death in Texas' execution chamber Tuesday night proclaiming his innocence, labeling Houston patrolman James Boswell a "policeman out of control" and insisting that he fired a bullet into the officer's head in self-defense.

"In killing me the people responsible have blood on their hands, because I am not guilty," Ogan said in his last statement, which eventually was cut off by the flow of deadly drugs. "I acted in self-defense and by reflex to an unprovoked attempted murder by a policeman out of control."

Speaking rapidly as Boswell's mother and other family members watched from an adjacent witness room, Ogan accused prosecutors of fabricating evidence in his 1990 trial. He said Boswell, 29, was "mad at the world" as a result of a brutal beating he had suffered seven months earlier at the hands of a crack cocaine dealer.

After the attack, Boswell was angry with "the mayor, the police chief, the fire chief, angry at the world, perhaps with some justification," Ogan said. His statement stopped in mid-sentence as the drugs took effect. In a meeting earlier, Walls Unit warden Neill Hodges had told Ogan he would have two minutes for his final comments. The drugs were given at 7:05 p.m.; he was pronounced dead eight minutes later.

Ogan was the first of two killers scheduled to be executed this week. William Wesley Chappell, 66, is set to die today for the 1988 murder of a 50-year-old Tarrant County woman and her daughter -- relatives of a 3-year-old girl Chappell was convicted of molesting four years earlier. Chappell was free on bond, pending appeal, when he shot both women in the face with a 9mm pistol, allegedly to eliminate them as trial witnesses.

The execution of a third killer, James Lee Clark, 34, set for Thursday, was postponed Monday by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals after his lawyers argued that he is mentally retarded. The court cited the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in June that barred execution of the mentally retarded. Clark had been convicted of the 1993 rape, robbery and murder of a 17-year-old Denton High School student.

Ogan's execution took place after the Supreme Court rejected two appeals filed on his behalf. The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles also declined to block the execution. As Ogan went to his death, about 80 law enforcement officers and their sympathizers -- members of two Houston motorcycle clubs -- gathered at the Walls Unit to show support for Boswell's family.

Texas Executes Cop Killer

By Robert Anthony Phillips - TheDeathHouse.com

November 19, 2002

Craig Owen, a former federal drug informant who shot and killed a Houston police officer, was executed by lethal injection here tonight after a last ditch appeal to the Supreme Court delayed his trip to the death house by an hour.

In December 1989, Ogan shot Officer James Boswell in the head after the officer did not immediately respond to Ogan's request for assistance. Ogan claimed he shot Boswell in self-defense.

As he lay strapped to the execution gurney awaiting death, Ogan, 47, used his last words to proclaim his innocense and accuse the state of murder. "The people responsible for killing me will have blood on their hands for an unprovoked murder," Ogan said. "I am not guilty."

Ogan's scheduled execution just after 6 p.m. was delayed while the U.S. Supreme Court considered last-ditch appeals filed by his lawyers. Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, said prison officials received word at 6:45 p.m. that the high court had rejected the appeals.

Within 10 minutes, she said, Ogan had been strapped to the execution gurney in preparation for death. The lethal drugs began to flow into him at 7:05 p.m. and he was pronounced dead at 7:13 p.m., Lyons said. Ogan was the 30th convicted killer executed in Texas this year, by far the highest in the nation. Another execution is scheduled Wednesday.

Ogan, in an interview with the Associated Press several weeks before his execution, said his lawyers were trying to "sell me as a nut case" and admitted he had little chance of escaping the death chamber. "I killed a cop and this is Texas," Ogan told the AP. There were reports that several dozen motorcycle riding police officers arrived to stand vigil outside on the street from the prison in honor of Boswell.

The slain cop's mother, had told the Texas City Sun that she was going to witness the execution. “I’m going to stand there and watch that man die,” she said. “His face was the last face that my son saw, if I could I’d make sure that Jim’s family’s faces were the last that he saw.”

Demand For Help Turns To Death

Ogan, described in court documents as paranoid and having a personality disorder, claimed he shot Boswell in self defense after the officer tried to shoot him. The shooting took place Dec. 9, 1989. Ogan had walked over to a police car in a parking lot in Houston, where Boswell and another officer had made a traffic stop.

Ogan had earlier become involved in a dispute at the motel he was staying in. Ogan knocked on the window of the patrol car, telling Boswell that he was a DEA informant and that he was cold. Boswell told Ogan to wait until he finished with the traffic stop. Ogan was so persistent and agitated that Boswell threatened to arrest him if Ogan didn't back away from the car.

When Boswell finally got out of the car, he had apparently unholstered his weapon, court documents stated. Holding the gun behind his right let, Boswell reached into the patrol car to unlock the back door to let Ogan in. Ogan pulled out a gun and shot Boswell in the head, shouting an expletive. Ogan tried to run, but another police officer with Boswell chased and shot him in the lower back. Ogan apparently felt drug dealers were going to kill him.

HPD Officer Remembered

By Michael Clements - The Texas City Sun

November 19, 2002

Boswell family of Meridian, Miss. came back to Texas this week. The family, who lived in Texas City more than 17 years, didn’t come back to visit friends or relatives. They came to Huntsville to see a man die. Unless the state or courts intervene, at 6 p.m. Craig Neil Ogan, 48, will be put to death for the Dec. 9, 1989 killing of 29-year-old Houston police officer James Boswell.

well’s mother, Martha, said the trip wasn’t about revenge, or anger or even closure. She said she came to Huntsville simply because she wanted to be there when the legal process was completed. “I’m going to stand there and watch that man die,” she said. “His face was the last face that my son saw, if I could I’d make sure that Jim’s family’s faces were the last that he saw.”

well’s story actually began when the police officer was 10 years old. That’s when Boswell’s father, Sonny, moved the family to the Texas Gulf Coast so he could go to work in a shipyard. For the next 17 years the Boswells enjoyed life in Texas. Martha Boswell said the Houston-Galveston industrial complex provided employment for Sonny. That enabled him to provide well for his wife and children. James Boswell graduated from Texas City High School and went to Lamar University where he studied to be an athletic trainer.

le he loved sports, Martha Boswell said her son was not particularly athletic. He decided to become a trainer so that he could work with people. Martha said people were drawn to her son’s outgoing personality. “He was a comedian,” she said. Texas City Police detective Paul Edinburgh agreed. Boswell was a regular fixture in the Edinburgh home because he was good friends with his older brother, Lewis. Edinburgh said that regardless of their mood when he found them, Boswell could leave just about anybody smiling. “If you were feeling down or lonely, he had a knack for showing up and he would leave you rolling on the floor laughing,” Edinburgh said.

nburgh remembered Boswell as a talented artist who did impressions and told jokes to entertain his family and friends. “He could talk to you in your voice and make you think you were talking to yourself,” said Martha Boswell.

well started his career as an athletic trainer in the late 1970s. Like a lot of young men, he soon realized that as much as he liked working with athletes, teaching and coaching might not have been his calling. One of his childhood friend’s, Donny McKinney was a police officer. McKinney would share stories of his work and something about those stories caught Boswell’s attention. He decided it was time for a career change. But, true to his character, Boswell’s mother said he felt a responsibility to check with her and his father since they had financed his college education.

y told him that their only concern was that he was happy with his decision. “His Dad and I both told him, ‘You’re the one that has to live with what you do,’” she said. Boswell went through the police training program at Sam Houston State University. In 1984 he was hired as a Houston Police Officer. He was assigned to an area in southwest Houston known for its criminal activity. Martha said her son reveled in his new work. “That’s where he wanted to work,” she said. “He loved being a cop.”

wasn’t long before Boswell was influencing young men in the same way his friends had influenced him. Edinburgh said that when he started his police training at College of the Mainland, he rode with Boswell a few times. He said his friend’s best qualities came out when he was on patrol. “He showed me the importance of honesty and integrity, that’s just the way he worked,” he said.

1987, Boswell’s family moved back to Mississippi. Sonny had lost his job with a construction company and when he found a new job at a hospital, the family decided to leave. Boswell stayed in Houston to continue his law enforcement career. According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Web site, on Dec. 9, 1989, Boswell and his partner were in the middle of a traffic stop on South Main near the Astromotor Inn when they were approached by Ogan.

Ogan was an informant for the Drug Enforcement Agency who had just been involved in an altercation at a motel. Ogan believed that his cover had been blown and that he was in danger, so he asked the officers to help him. Since no one was actually threatening Ogan at that point, and the officers were busy doing something else, Boswell told Ogan to wait. Ogan became agitated and demanded the officers listen to him. Boswell decided to put Ogan in his patrol car and turned to open the car door. When he did, Ogan pulled a pistol and shot Boswell once in the left temple. He turned to run and was shot once in the lower back by Boswell’s partner.

Martha said she got the telephone call from Boswell’s brother Joey, who owned a business in Texas City at that time. He told her that Boswell had been hurt. She called the hospital and learned that it was worse than that. Martha said she and Sonny came back to Texas to get their son and take him home to be buried in Mississippi. “I wasn’t going to leave my baby out there,” she said.

Then they prepared for the trial. She praised the work of the judge, who she said ensured that everyone involved in the trial followed the letter of the law. And she scoffed at Ogan’s claim that he shot in self defense after the officers threatened him. Edinburgh, who also attended the trial, said there was no way his friend threatened anyone that day. “I just can’t see that,” he said. “It doesn’t compute to me.”

Edinburgh will be in Hunstville tonight. While he won’t witness the execution, he said he feels a responsibility to be there for his friends. His brother, who was much closer to Boswell will be there, and Edinburg said he wants to do what he can. “I’m going for a lot of different reasons,” he said.

Graig Ogan, Jr. (TX) - Nov. 19, 2002 - 6:00 PM CST, 7:00 PM EST

The state of Texas is scheduled to execute Graig Ogan, Jr. Nov. 19 for the 1989 murder of James Boswell, a Houston police officer.

Ogan, a white man, claimed he shot Boswell in self-defense after the officer attempted to pull out his gun while lunging toward him. Conflicting accounts, one from Boswell’s partner – Morgan Gainer – and one from the defendant himself, told different versions of the events that occurred immediately before the shooting. At trial, the jury determined that Ogan’s self-defense claim lacked credibility, and found him guilty of murder.

The victim’s family and friends found relief in the verdict, as it publicly cleared Boswell of any wrongdoing in the incident. However, they expressed mixed feeling about the death sentence, repeatedly recognizing that little good could come out of another killing. Sonny Boswell, the victim’s father, said after the trial, “His death is not going to bring my son back.”

Ogan – an informant with the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in Houston – allegedly approached Boswell’s police car to seek help because he was in mortal danger at the hands of armed drug dealers. He claimed the officer stepped out of the car and attacked him; Officer Gainer disagreed, saying the aggressive Ogan shot his partner without provocation.

Sally Webster, a forensic psychologist, testified for the defense at trial, stating that Ogan experienced several psychological problems when he arrived in Houston (from St. Louis, which he left in 1989 after several narcotics trafficking prosecutions revealed his identity). She claimed he suffered from functional paranoia, and frequently felt anxiety, agitation, and fear for his life. In his appeals, Ogan argued that his trial counsel failed to recognize the extent of his mental health problems; such a mistake could have seriously influenced the outcome of his trial.

He also charged that his attorneys failed to object to supplemental instruction on mitigating evidence at the conclusion of the penalty phase. This failure, which minimized the importance of Ogan’s emotional instability in the jurors’ eyes, paved the way for this execution.

(Ogan Homepage)

Information provided by Craig Ogan and his supporters

For over nine years, the State of Texas has been holding me hostage, torturing me, and threatening to murder me, because I fatally shot and killed a Houston Police officer when he attempted to murder me for being (in his and his partner’s words) “a f---ing DEA snitch” (a voluntary undercover operative for the United States Drug Enforcement Administration [DEA] since 1973, I’d sought their help because I was in imminent mortal danger from armed drug dealers; as the City of Houston Police Department [HPD] had rescued me from mortal danger, hours earlier, at the DEA’s request, I’d no reason to anticipate that these officers would try to kill me, now, in response to my polite request for emergency assistance). I have compelling proof that I’m telling the truth. --- Craig Ogan

"TEXAS MURDERING CHILDREN AND FAMILIES" by Craig N. Ogan

For over nine years, the State of Texas has been holding me hostage, torturing me, and threatening to murder me, because I fatally shot a Houston Police officer when he attempted to murder me for being (in his and his partner’s words) “a f---ing DEA snitch” (a voluntary undercover operative for the United States Drug Enforcement Administration [DEA] since 1973, I’d sought their help because I was in imminent mortal danger from armed drug dealers; as the City of Houston Police Department [HPD] had rescued me from mortal danger, hours earlier, at the DEA’s request, I’d no reason to anticipate that these officers would try to kill me, now, in response to my polite request for emergency assistance). I have compelling proof that I’m telling the truth.*

When and if the State of Texas executes me, however, they (Governor Bush, legislators, Texas Supreme Court justices, judges, jurors, citizens & voters who tolerate and support the death penalty,...) will not only be murdering me (and covering up the officers’ federal-felony attempts to murder this federal drug operative). They (with official approval of the President and Supreme Court of the United States) will, in effect, also be killing the children (and their children, and those children’s children,...) whom I might otherwise beget. I.e., Texas will be killing and destroying a potential branch of my family’s bloodline, thereby committing, under color of law, what amounts to PREMEDITATED MASS MURDER of dozens (or hundreds, or thousands,...) of Ogans who might otherwise be born, during this era and who knows how many generations to come.

Those future Ogans (who might otherwise enter the world) have not been accused, much less convicted, of any crime, whereas one or more of them might, for all anyone knows, be blessed with the intellect of an Albert Einstein or George Washington Carver, or with other attributes and talents that could vastly benefit humanity and alter the course of history. Who (but God) can say with certainty that one of them would not be a medical researcher who develops a vaccine for some deadly disease(s), saving millions of lives; or an astrophysicist who enables humans to colonize other planets; or a brilliant diplomat who prevents a global nuclear war and saves the human race? HAVEN’T THEY A RIGHT TO LIFE, REGARDLESS?

Capital punishment is thus also MASS ABORTION, before conception (before human conception, i.e.; we don’t know when God’s conception of a particular human occurs), forcibly carried out by the state, in a vicious vindictive attack on the entire (present and future) family of a condemned person.

As it is applied in a racially (and otherwise) discriminatory manner, capital punishment is also GENOCIDE, disproportionately destroying bloodlines of disadvantaged races, classes, etc. Some may argue that life imprisonment, without conjugal visits, has the same effect, as this also prevents the prisoner from having any (more) children. I agree, and I submit that this is a powerful moral and legal argument for allowing conjugal visits in prisons. However, where there’s life there’s hope; so, capital punishment differs, in this regard, in that it is absolute and final. Either way, the state is playing God, at an incalculable cost to all humanity.

Craig N. Ogan, 25 December 1998
Texas Death Camp Hostage #000979
Polunsky Unit, Texas Death Camp
3872 FM 350, South
Livingston, Texas 77351 USA

Please bear in mind, as you read this account, that I have offered, since just after the event, to submit to polygraphs, voice-stress tests, interrogation under truth serum or hypnosis, and/or any other reasonable truth-eliciting test, to prove that I was and am telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about every detail I could possibly recall re the tragedy (and note that I offered at my “trial” to take Sodium Pentothal, e.g., to further enhance my memory). Specifically, I have made this offer, voluntarily and on my own initiative, to the trial court, to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (in phone calls I was pre-advised were being tape-recorded), and (in letters written in my hand and signed with my legal signature) to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the United States Naval Investigative Service, and the Central Intelligence Agency. Also, please keep in mind that I had been a federal operative/informant, voluntarily, since 1973; and the Houston Police Department (HPD) had just saved my life, about four hours earlier. Moreover, when this shooting occurred, I was just a few hours from a scheduled meeting with a CIA agent, to accept his offer (approximately three hours earlier) of “immediate employment”, helping rescue U.S. citizens illegally imprisoned overseas (just as I am now, in the USA).

On 9 December 1989, at approximately 1:00 A.M., on South Main Street in Houston, Texas, I walked up to an HPD squad car on a convenience-store parking lot, tapped lightly on the passenger-side window, and entered “The Twilight Zone”.... -

OFFICER [JAMES C. BOSWELL] (rolling his window down partway): “You got a problem?” (Note: Possibly not his exact words; I cannot recall, clearly or with certainty, his first sentence; but he seemed irritable, or even hostile and confrontational, making me anxious to quickly assure him, by word and manner, that I posed no threat, was respectful and had a serious request). -

ME: “Oh, I’m just a little upset with this (expletive) motel over here...” (Then, quickly and apologetically:) “Pardon my French, sir; I’m just a little upset with THEM. Anyway, I wonder if you could help me, sir; your HPD just removed me from a very precarious situation and escorted me to this area, a few hours ago, at the request of the DEA...” -

OFFICER BOSWELL (interrupting, loudly and belligerently): “What the fuck you talking about, ‘the DEA’?” -

ME (tentatively): “Yes, sir, I’m working as a C.I. [confidential informant] for the DEA.” -

OFFICER BOSWELL (leaning back against his partner and sneering sarcastically/contemptuously at me, and demanding loudly and hatefully): “You mean to tell me you’re a fuckin’ DEA snitch?!” (Then, even more loudly and menacingly) “You want me to tell everyone out here you’re a fuckin’ snitch for the DEA?!” (Note: The “everyone out here” whom he referred to included several small groups of rough-looking people loitering nearby, behind me. For a number of reasons, I suspected they might be selling drugs, most likely crack cocaine.) -

ME (startled, confused, and terrified by his hateful angry reaction to learning that I was a DEA informant, and by his threats to blow my cover [which I feared he might have already done], I suddenly felt trapped, as I was afraid to turn around and have my face seen by the drug dealers [?] behind me, but was also very afraid of this [heavily-armed] policeman [whom I’d perceived as an island of security, moments before] who’d suddenly revealed himself to be a threat to my life. So, I leaned forward slightly and asked, politely and softly): “Sir, is that really how you feel about what I do? I thought I was helping the police.” [Note: I was instinctively trying to defuse and contain his (for me, life-threatening) outbursts.] -

OFFICER BOSWELL (screaming explosively, he appeared to be possibly on the verge of exiting the car): “You’re fuckin’ right that’s how I feel! Now get the fuck outa here!” (Note that his partner, Officer Clay Morgan Gainer, also called me a “fucking snitch”; I believe it was at this point in time.) -

ME (retreating quickly and speaking timidly/apologetically): “All right sir; I was only asking for help.” -

OFFICER BOSWELL: “WHAT did you say, motherfucker?!”

ME: “I said, ‘All right, sir; I was only asking for help.’ ” -

OFFICER BOSWELL (throwing his door open and bursting out of the car in an insane rage, running/lunging furiously right at me, like a football tackle gone berserk, and clawing frantically at his gun/holster): “I don’t give a fuck WHAT you’re asking for!” -

ME (paralyzed/hypnotized by terror, with nowhere to run, duck, or hide, as it sank in [through my shocked disbelief] that this police officer was violently attacking me and was about to shoot me, at point-blank range, I still did not react to defend myself; but in a desperate appeal for calm/reason, I dropped, instinctively, into a defensive stance, bracing myself for the imminent impact [of bullets or his body, or both], and yelled): “Sir!” (My right hand may have moved toward my gun, at this point; I’m not sure, as it all happened so fast. Again, I’ll gladly submit to memory-enhancement efforts by the FBI, et al.)

He screamed, “You son-of-a-bitch!”; and I saw his gun clear the holster and/or come into view. Reflex took over. I heard an explosion and saw his body slam back against the side of the patrol car and crumple to the ground, lifeless (i.e., he appeared lifeless; I later learned that he had lived a few more hours, although he never regained consciousness). Then I saw the gun in my hand, as the horrible realization crept over me...; I had just shot a policeman in the head. I said something (“Oh, my God!” [?]), in horror and dismay. His partner was kneeling outside of his side of the car, frantically yelling into his radio, “My partner’s been hit!” He was an easy target, as he was right across the front seat from me (apparently, I’d run forward to the side of the car, after firing, because I know I had retreated quite a good distance, prior to Officer Boswell’s exit ó far enough for him to break into a furious run, and for me to overcome my shock and disbelief enough to react in time); and I considered for a moment that he would probably blow me in half with a 12-gauge (shotgun) if I didn’t shoot him first. But he wasn’t reaching for a gun or pointing a gun at me, at that moment; he was in a panic, and I clearly recall looking into his eyes and seeing and feeling his fear. So, even though I expected him to kill me, I could not bring myself to shoot him, with even a few moments to think about it, and after 16 -17 years of voluntarily working on the side of law enforcement (also, I’d never even hunted or shot an animal before; so, I’m sure I was in a state of shock and confusion). Instead, I turned around and ran, in panic and horror, running being the only apparent option to shooting this officer, too (he’d just sat there agreeing with Officer Boswell that I was “a fucking DEA snitch”, vs. encouraging him to stop threatening and endangering my life and find out who I was and what kind of help I needed; so, what else could I expect from him but gunfire, now that I’d been forced to shoot his partner?). I’m told that I ran about 200 feet before a .45 slug slammed into my back, about an inch left of my spine, at or just below the waist. Skidding to a halt, I threw my gun down, put my hands up, and yelled, “O.K.!” He ran up behind me, screaming, “Where’s the gun? Where’s the fucking gun?,” to which I responded cooperatively, telling him I had thrown it down in the grass, just in front and to the right of me. He threw me face-down on the ground, cuffed my hands behind my back, and began beating and kicking me. Half of my back seemed to have been blown away, blood was gushing out of me, and I was sure I was dying (in fact, at one point I had a vision [?] in which I believed I had died, and that I was “going to God”, spinning/flying through a tunnel of kaleidoscopic colors, passing through doorways or gateways, always toward an intense white light which I believed was God. It may have been my subconscious mind recording images from a rushing ambulance, or as I was rushed through hospital corridors. I’ve since read about research on near-death experiences, however; and many of the accounts I’ve read described something very similar to what I saw and experienced. Who knows?). Also, I was in shock, thoroughly terrified, and absolutely hysterical with grief that I had just shot a human being (a policeman!) in the head (& at gruesomely point-blank range, too). As Officer Gainer was beating and kicking me, I even asked him, “Why don’t you just go ahead and put a bullet in my head and get it over with, and go help your partner?,” to which he responded, “If there weren’t so many witnesses, I would kill you, you son-of-a-bitch!” A paramedic testified at my “trial” that, right after shooting Officer Boswell and being shot, I was saying, “Oh, please don’t let him die! Let it be me!” An HPD officer who saw me right after the shooting provided similar testimony (grudgingly).

Tragic though all of this was and is, I am not guilty of capital murder, as I reacted, by reflex, in legally (and I pray, morally) justifiable self-defense, at the last possible moment, after/while attempting to retreat in the face of Officer Boswell’s illegal unprovoked attempt to murder me because (!!!) I was a DEA informant. It is easy to understand why HPD, Officer Gainer, and the prosecution preferred to conceal the truth, commit perjury, and execute an innocent man: HPD officers had shot 40 citizens to death, already, in 1989, including Ida Lee Delaney and Byron Gillum (both of which shootings had attracted national and even international media and public attention and condemnation, as had the sheer number of such shootings [a 122% increase over the 18 fatal shootings by HPD in 1988], many of which were highly controversial for their dubious justification, if any).

Besides, Officers Boswell and Gainer both committed federal felonies (VIOLENT INTIMIDATION AND ATTEMPTED MURDER OF A FEDERAL WITNESS) against the United States and me; thus, if the truth had been exposed, Officer Gainer most likely would have been facing a long stay in a federal penitentiary; Officer Boswell would no longer be a viable “HPD hero who died in the line of duty”; and HPD’s already-scandalous reputation would have been burdened with yet another shocking case of police brutality. (Note: the DEA had just arrested two HPD officers, hours before my tragic encounter with Officers Boswell and Gainer, for selling confidential information from HPD computers to drug dealers; but my jurors were not told of this, even as they were not told that Officer Boswell had been beaten severely with his own nightstick, seven months earlier, by a drug suspect he was trying to arrest; Officer Boswell’s injuries included brain contusions, 72 stitches in his head, and loosened teeth that required months of treatment.) So, Officer Gainer, via his fabrication and perjury, has thus far avoided imprisonment (and fraudulently passed himself off as “the hero cop who shot his partner’s murderer, arrested him, and helped secure his imprisonment and sentence of death”), and (as far as I know) has kept his job (and badge, 12 gauge, and .45), at great risk to public safety, and at the cost of truth, justice, and my life, freedom, and reputation (more than nine years of hell, already, for my family and me).

God has not abandoned me, however. When I wrote to Mr. Wendell Bailey, then-Treasurer of Missouri, about 6-7 years ago, pleading for his help in persuading the FBI or some other agency (or private investigator, etc.) to investigate this unlawfully and wrongfully imprisoned and condemned Missourian’s allegations, a man of God responded.

Rev. Steve J. Ackerman, after being referred to my case by Mr. Bailey, has been investigating ever since (1992), and has found compelling and abundant evidence of my veracity and actual innocence, and of extensive fabrication, perjury, and cover up by Officer Gainer, HPD, and the prosecution. But he is working on a severely limited budget, and has not received much cooperation, so far, from my Texas-appointed attorneys. Please contact him (Rev. Steve J. Ackerman, (phone: 1-520-881-2650; address: 2444 East 4th Street, Tucson, Arizona 85719 USA), to learn more about what his investigation has revealed; and

PLEASE TRY TO HELP US BEFORE TEXAS MURDERS ME. Thank You ! - Craig N. Ogan

June 28, 2002