Murderpedia has thousands of hours of work behind it. To keep creating
new content, we kindly appreciate any donation you can give to help
the Murderpedia project stay alive. We have many
plans and enthusiasm
to keep expanding and making Murderpedia a better site, but we really
need your help for this. Thank you very much in advance.
John Allen
RUBIO
Classification: Murderer
Characteristics: Parricide
- Chronic drug use, especially inhaling of spray paint - Believing
the children were possessed by evil spirits
Number of victims: 3
Date of murders:
March 11,
2003
Date of arrest:
Same day
Date of birth:
August 12,
1980
Victims profile: Julissa Quezada, 3; John Esthefan Rubio, 1; and Mary Jane Rubio, 2
months
(his children)
Method of murder:
Smothering,
stabbing and decapitating
Location: Cameron County, Texas, USA
Status: Sentenced to death on November 24, 2003. Overturned
2007. Resentenced to death on July 27, 2010
On March 11, 2003, in Cameron
County, Texas, Rubio and co-defendant Camacho fatally stabbed
and beheaded Rubio's 2 month old daughter, his 1 year old son
and Camacho's 3 year old daughter.
Co-defendants
Camacho, Maria Angela
Race and Gender of Victim
Hispanic/Female,
Hispanic/Male, Hispanic/Female
Texas man, John Rubio,
sentenced to death after beheading 3 children
FlyNews.com
July 30, 2010
A jury sentenced a south Texas man to death on
Thursday, four days after convicting him of capital murder for
beheading his common law wife’s three children in 2003.
It was the second time John Allen Rubio has
been sentenced to death for the slayings. He was convicted of
killing the children all under the age of four — smothering,
stabbing and ultimately decapitating them — in a windowless
Brownsville apartment.
Before entering the sentence, Hidalgo County
District Judge Noe Gonzalez asked Rubio if there was anything he
would like to say.
“I’m sorry it all had to come to this,” Rubio
said quietly. “I thank the jury for giving me a chance to show
what I could.”
Gonzalez, who said he had sentenced more people
to death than any judge in south Texas, said he recognized that a
lot of people went through what Rubio did, citing his abusive and
troubled childhood.
“I don’t know what happened, but I know what
this jury found,” Gonzalez said. “I have never seen a crime like
this.” Jurors deliberated for about four hours.
Jurors on Monday found Rubio guilty on four
counts of capital murder — one charge for each child and one for
the children together.
Rubio was previously convicted of the murders
in 2003 and sentenced to death. But a state appeals court
overturned his conviction in 2007 because statements from the
children’s mother, Angela Camacho, were wrongly allowed as
evidence during the trial. Camacho pleaded guilty and is serving a
life sentence for her role in the slayings.
At his current trial, Rubio pleaded not guilty
by reason of insanity, but the jury rejected that defense.
John Allen Rubio's Fight For
Life Continues
By Marcy Martinez -
ValleyCentral.com
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
BROWNSVILLE -- It was six years ago that three
black trash bags were pulled from a Brownsville apartment, inside
them, the dismembered bodies of three little children.
The man who once confessed to killing them
still sits in a courtroom just around the corner.
Now he's back in court. Clad in the same white
shirt, slacks and glasses with the same demeanor, same goal, to
live.
John Allen Rubio could end up on death row all
over again, but for now, he's involved in hearing after hearing.
On this day, his defense tries to get the
District Attorney's Office disqualified from the case because of
an attorney who helped get Rubio's murder conviction overturned.
"They say Al Padilla worked for the District
Attorney's Office and may have given them a leg up on the defense,
but the judge didn't find that," explains Action 4 legal analyst
John Blaylock.
But both sides still have many more hurdles to
jump to either save or take Rubio's life.
"When the State of Texas decides to take a
human life and kill somebody--which they're trying to do to John
Allen Rubio, you've got to cross every ‘t’ and dot every ‘I’,"
says Blaylock.
Attorneys will work to agree on which experts
will examine Rubio to determine his mental state at the time of
the murders of the three children.
"Rubio is so close to the line of mental
retardation and you can't execute a person below the level of
mental retardation-- only experts can decide where they are on
that line.", explains Blaylock.
Blaylock says in his last trial Rubio asked for
the death penalty and obviously has now decided to fight for his
life, a fight that is costing taxpayers big dollars to keep one
man breathing. A man who in a taped confession in 2003 told
police he had not only used a machete, but his hands to behead one
of the three children.
A hearing is scheduled to decide change of
venue. Our legal analysts say the probability of that happening
is low.
Court throws
out John Allen Rubio conviction in child beheading case
By Michael Graczyk - Associated
Press
Sep. 12, 2007
HOUSTON (AP) — A Brownsville man condemned for
killing and beheading his common-law wife's three children had his
conviction overturned Wednesday by a sharply divided Texas Court
of Criminal Appeals.
In a 5-4 ruling, the state's highest criminal
appeals court said John Allen Rubio's conviction and death
sentence four years ago were improper because statements from his
common-law wife, Angela Camacho, erroneously were allowed into
evidence. The court said Rubio's lawyers were not allowed to
challenge Camacho's statements by cross-examining her because she
refused to testify.
Three statements she made about the slayings —
two in writing and one on a videotape — were offered into
testimony by a police officer at Rubio's trial. The trial judge,
over objections from Rubio's lawyers, allowed the testimony.
``Given Camacho's unique position as both
accomplice to the crime and direct witness to (Rubio's)
motivations, her specific, detailed testimony obviously had great
significance,'' the court said.
The judges in the majority also noted Camacho
herself was facing indictment for capital murder when she talked
with police.
"Obviously, then, she could have been under
some pressure to modify her story, given her own participation in
the murders,'' the court said. ``That is precisely the type of
issue (Rubio) was not able to address on cross-examination.
"It is difficult to see how cross-examining
the interrogating officers, who can only speculate as to Camacho's
motives and influences to testify, would have anywhere near the
same effect as cross-examining Camacho herself.''
A day after Rubio was convicted for the March
2003 slayings, the same Cameron County jury decided he should be
put to death.
Camacho avoided a possible death sentence by
taking a plea agreement two years ago that sent her to prison with
three life terms.
Rubio, 27, had pleaded not guilty by reason of
insanity. He admitted to suffocating, stabbing and decapitating
Julissa Quezada, 3; John Esthefan Rubio, 1; and Mary Jane Rubio, 2
months. The children were found were dead at the family's squalid
apartment after Rubio's brother called police. The two girls had
been stuffed into a plastic garbage bag. The boy was on a bed.
Rubio had told a judge he wanted to be executed
but since then has pursued appeals. Lawyers raised 12 points of
error from his trial. By overturning the conviction on the first
point, judges did not rule on the other 11 and sent the case back
to the trial court.
The appeals court in Austin said while the
admission of Camacho's statements did not automatically merit
reversal, ``the only real issue in contention at the guilt-innocence
phase was (Rubio's) state of mind.'' The court said the primary
relevant evidence came in statements from Rubio and Camacho.
``The crucial evidence to rebut (Rubio's)
contention that he was not guilty by reason of insanity came
almost exclusively from one source: Camacho's state-ments,'' the
court noted. ``We can say that her statements likely contributed
to the jury's verdict of guilt, such that the error in admitting
her statements at trial clearly prejudiced (Rubio's) case.''
Rubio's trial lawyers said the violence and
senselessness of the murders meant he had to be insane at the
time. Rubio blamed a witchcraft-practicing mother and grandmother
casting a spell for causing the children to become pos-sessed, and
his attorneys argued the story was almost too far-fetched for some-one
with an IQ of 76 to concoct. As a child, his IQ was measured at
92, which is in the normal range.
Psychiatrists testifying in the trial said
Rubio's chronic drug use, especially his inhaling of spray paint,
contributed to the murders.
Prosecutors suggested it was an overall life of
depravity, including prostitution, drugs and a filthy apartment,
that led to a decision to kill the children.
In a dissent written by Sharon Keller, the
appeals court's presiding judge, and joined by two other judges,
Keller said while admitting Camacho's statements into evidence was
an error, it was harmless because the jury decided Rubio was not
legally insane.
``Mental illness can indeed excuse criminal
conduct, but only for a narrow range of offenders,'' she wrote. ``Given
the evidence in this case, it seems clear to me that John Rubio is
not within that range.''
A fourth judge, Lawrence Meyers, dissented from
the majority ruling but did not join in Keller's opinion.
Mom gets life for her kids' decapitation
deaths
The Houston Chronicle
June 30, 2005
BROWNSVILLE — A woman pleaded guilty to three
counts of capital murder today in the decapitation deaths of her
three young children, getting three concurrent life prison
sentences instead of the death penalty.
Angela Camacho, 25, will be eligible for parole
in 40 years. Her attorneys failed to prove she was mentally
retarded and therefore ineligible for the death penalty, but the
plea agreement spared her. Had she been convicted and sentenced to
death, she would have become the first Mexican national female on
Texas’ death row.
Camacho and 24-year-old John Allen Rubio, her
common-law husband, were accused of strangling and decapitating
her two daughters, 3-year-old Julissa Quezada and 2-month-old Mary
Jane Rubio, in 2003. The couple allegedly washed themselves
afterward and had sex before decapitating their 1-year-old son,
John Esthefan Rubio.
A relative called police, who found the girls
stuffed in a trash bag and the boy on a bed. Rubio and Camacho
told police they thought the children were possessed.
Camacho answered state District Judge Benjamin
Euresti’s questions in Spanish as he accepted her guilty plea.
“I hope that God will touch your heart and that
you ask for forgiveness,” Euresti said. “Good luck to you.”
Alberto Pullen, one of Camacho’s attorneys,
said she would face deportation if released from prison. He said
she wants to stay in the U.S.
Rubio was convicted and sentenced to death in
2003 after he requested the death penalty. Rubio has since decided
to fight the sentence. In February, he was found competent to
choose his attorney for the appeal.
According to evidence during Rubio’s trial, he
had inhaled so much spray paint that he had damaged his brain and
might have been psychotic.
Camacho’s case was tied up for more than two
years due to issues of her mental health.
John Rubio sentenced to death
Man convicted of murdering three children
sentenced to death requesting execution
Lynn Brezoski - Bayarea.com
November 8, 2003
BROWNSVILLE, Texas – A man who confessed to
suffocating, stabbing and beheading his common-law wife’s three
young children was sentenced to death Friday after telling a judge
he wanted to be executed.
Jurors sentenced John Allen Rubio to death by
injection a day after convicting him of three counts of capital
murder, one for each of the children he admitted killing on March
11.
Rubio, 23, and his common-law wife, Angela
Camacho, told police they killed 3-year-old Julissa Quezada, 1-year-old
John Esthefan Rubio and 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio because they
thought the children were possessed and they didn’t want them to
grow up evil.
Camacho, 23, is awaiting a hearing on whether
she is mentally competent to stand trial.
Rubio and his attorney delivered the request
for the death penalty moments after prosecutors began their
opening statements in the penalty phase of the trial.
“Do you understand what you are asking for?”
State District Judge Robert Garza asked Rubio.
“Yes sir,” Rubio responded.
Alfredo Padilla asked his client, “Is it your
belief that God has forgiven you and you want to be with your
children in heaven?” Rubio agreed.
Although prosecutors also sought the death
penalty, they said Rubio was just trying to play on jurors’
emotions.
“Do not give this man the answer that he wants
because he asked for it,” prosecutor Paxton Warner said. “What
he’s trying to do now is what he’s done his entire life; he is
trying to prey on you and prey on your emotions. This is not about
remorse, ladies and gentlemen, once again this is all about him.”
Rubio could have received life in prison.
During the trial, Rubio’s attorneys said he
came from a background of poverty, substance abuse and witchcraft,
and argued that he was legally insane at the time the children
were killed.
While Rubio was diagnosed as a child with
emotional problems, prosecutor Karen Betancourt said he had no
history of mental illness, and that there was abundant evidence
that Rubio knew what he had done was wrong.
Prosecutors suggested it was an overall life of
depravity, including prostitution, drugs and a filthy apartment,
that led to a decision to kill the children.
Mary Anderson, a psychiatrist who was a witness
for the prosecution, said Rubio’s inhalation of spray paint over
time may have created a psychotic state, but she added that he
knew his actions were wrong.
In the Court of Criminal
Appeals of Texas
No. AP-74,852
John Allen Rubio, Appellant, v.
The State of Texas
Appeal from Cameron County
Womack, J.,
delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Price, Johnson,
Holcomb, and Cochran, JJ., joined. Keller, P.J., filed a
dissenting opinion, in which Keasler and Hervey, JJ., joined.
Meyers, J., dissented.
The appellant was indicted on four counts of
capital murder
(1) related to the
killing and decapitation of his three children: Julissa Quesada (age
3), John E. Rubio (age 14 months), and Mary Jane Rubio (age 2
months). The appellant pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity
(2) to all four
counts. The jury found the appellant guilty, and rendered a
verdict on the issue of punishment that required the trial court
to sentence the appellant to death.
(3) In the appeal
to this court, required by statute,
(4) the appellant
raises twelve points of error. We will reverse.
I. Did the
trial court err by admitting Camacho's statements?
In his first point of error, the appellant
argues the trial court erred during the guilt-innocence phase of
the trial by admitting the statements of Maria Angela Camacho, the
appellant's common-law wife and alleged accomplice in the murders
for which he was being tried. Camacho invoked her Fifth Amendment
right to not testify in open court, and the state offered three
statements she made to the police regarding the murders, two
written statements and one oral statement recorded on videotape.
Over the appellant's objection, the trial court admitted all three
statements. The written statements were read to the jury by the
Brownsville Police Department detectives who originally took the
statements. The videotaped statement was played for the jury, who
also received a written transcript. The appellant was never able
to cross-examine Camacho, either at the time she made the
statements or during the trial.
At the time of the appellant's trial, the
admissibility of out-of-court statements against a defendant where
the declarant was unavailable for cross-examination was governed
by Ohio v. Roberts.
(5) Under
Roberts, such a statement was admissible so long as it bore
adequate "indicia of reliability" or otherwise fell within a "firmly
rooted hearsay exception."
(6)
Since the time of the appellant's trial,
however, the Supreme Court overruled Roberts by
announcing its opinion in Crawford v. Washington.
(7) Under
Crawford, non-testimonial hearsay evidence would still be
admissible under a scheme like that in Roberts, but the
Court made clear that, "Where testimonial evidence is at issue, .
. . the Sixth Amendment demands what the common law required:
unavailability and prior opportunity for cross-examination."
(8) Although the
Court declined to define specifically what is encompassed by the
term "testimonial," they did say that at a minimum it includes "police
interrogations," because they are one of "the modern practices
with closest kinship to the abuses at which the Confrontation
Clause was directed."
(9)
The trial court in this case held Camacho's
statements to be sufficiently reliable, and so they were admitted.
The State does not dispute that Camacho's statements were given
during a police interrogation and therefore testimonial in nature.
The State also acknowledges that Camacho had invoked her Fifth
Amendment right at trial and was therefore unavailable to testify.
The State does not concede that the trial court erred in admitting
Camacho's statements under the law in effect at the time. But the
State does concede the Supreme Court's holding that new rules of
criminal procedure are to be "applied retroactively to all cases,
state or federal, pending on direct review or not yet final,"
(10) and that
Crawford came into effect while the appellant's case was
pending on direct appeal.
Accordingly, we hold that the trial court erred
in admitting Camacho's statements. We will now turn to the issue
of prejudice.
II. Did the trial
court's error prejudice the appellant's case?
The erroneous admission of Camacho's statements
does not automatically merit reversal. Rather, any Confrontation
Clause violation, once proven, is subject to harmless error
analysis.
(11) In other words,
this Court will reverse the conviction unless we determine beyond
a reasonable doubt that the error did not contribute to the
appellant's conviction.
(12) If there is a
reasonable likelihood that the error materially affected the
jury's deliberations, then the error was not harmless beyond a
reasonable doubt.
(13)
An appellate court should not focus on the
propriety of the outcome of the trial.
(14) Instead, we
calculate the probable impact of the error on the jury, in light
of all other evidence available.
(15) Evidence of
the defendant's guilt should be considered, but that is only one
factor in the analysis.
(16) The question,
ultimately, is whether the State has proven beyond a reasonable
doubt that the error complained of did not contribute to the
verdict obtained.
(17)
In the instant case, the appellant pleaded not
guilty by reason of insanity to all four counts in the capital
murder indictment. He did not contest that he committed the acts
which killed the children. Therefore, the only real issue in
contention at the guilt-innocence phase was the appellant's state
of mind. The primary evidence relevant to that issue came in the
form of statements the appellant and Camacho made to the police.
We will now turn to those.
The Appellant's
Statement
In his own videotaped statement to the police,
which was also admitted at trial, the appellant freely admitted to
having killed his children.
The appellant said he met Camacho when they
were living in the same apartment complex in 2000 or 2001. He used
to inhale spray paint with Camacho's then-live-in boyfriend and,
after seeing her physically abused by him, she and the appellant
became romantically involved. Camacho eventually left her former
boyfriend and moved in with the appellant.
Camacho brought her child Julissa with her, who
at the time was less than a year old. Camacho was also pregnant
with John, who was born eight or nine months later. Although it
was unclear who John's father was, the appellant and Camacho
decided to name John after the appellant and give him the
appellant's surname. Shortly after John was born, Camacho became
pregnant again, and gave birth to Mary Jane in January of 2003.
During this time the appellant held a number of
low-wage retail jobs, and the family moved several times,
including time spent in friends' houses and sometimes living on
the streets. Eventually they moved into a home they shared with
the appellant's mother and one other person.
The appellant said Child Protective Services
took custody of Julissa and John at one point during this time,
after finding the appellant was abusing spray paint in front of
the children. This incident inspired him to find a job so he could
get the children back, because he "adored" them and "would do
anything for" them. CPS returned the children after three or four
months - after the appellant got a job - but continued to visit
the home to check on the children and to test the appellant for
illegal drug use. Those tests, the appellant claimed, never
yielded a positive result for illegal drugs.
The appellant said CPS stopped making home
visits after he got a job at Golden Corral. He lost this job in
December of 2002, a month before Mary Jane was born. During that
time, in order to make money to pay rent and provide for the
children, the appellant did some odd jobs but also prostituted
himself. He learned how to be a prostitute from his mother, who
had encouraged him to do so.
With the money the appellant made through
prostitution, he was able to pay the rent when it came due on
January 11th and February 11th of 2003, but he did not have enough
money for the March 11th payment. He had $175 in a wallet, but it
was stolen from his house. He asked his brother if the family
could move into his brother's house, but his brother refused. He
asked his brother's girlfriend Beva to loan him the money, but she
too refused. Around this time, the family found out the food stamp
benefits for the children were being cut off because of a problem
with the children's paperwork. Because of the various money
problems the family was experiencing, the appellant decided to
take the children to a local homeless shelter. This was the day
before the children were murdered.
That same evening, the appellant's mother came
to the front door of the house. The appellant had recently thrown
his mother out of the house because she had not paid her share of
the rent. The appellant let his mother inside the house because
she was now acting very nicely towards him, but once inside, she
began to act strangely. She was pacing back and forth,
alternatively smiling at him and acting angry towards him, and
talking to herself. She left after less than an hour. Shortly
after that, the appellant heard another knock at the door. This
time it was Lorena, a male transvestite prostitute who was the
other tenant in the house with the appellant and his family.
Lorena was with a friend. They stayed approximately twenty
minutes, talking amongst themselves, then left. It was now close
to midnight.
Camacho and the children were still awake,
watching television in the bedroom. Because the appellant's head
was hurting, he turned off the television and turned on the radio
to listen to Christian music in order to distract himself. He and
the children began to fall asleep, but Camacho woke him up. He
then put John into the crib, while the two girls remained sleeping
on the bed.
The appellant returned to lay down on the bed
and listen to music. As he lay there, he said he suddenly felt
weird, as if something bad was going to happen. He began to hear
strange, scary noises, and he saw mice running around on the floor,
which he had never before seen in that house. He then heard his
hamsters fighting with each other, which was also unusual. He kept
five to seven hamsters as pets in a cage near his bed. He
described what he saw next as being "like a movie, or something I
saw on TV." The hamsters would look at him with a nasty expression
and then growl. He said this had happened only rarely before, and
only when his mother or Lorena were at the house.
The appellant then decided to kill the hamsters,
which he did by spraying them with hairspray so they would choke.
He brought the cage into the front room of the house. Some were
still alive, so he put bleach on them, and then took them out one
at a time and smashed their heads with a hammer. He then flushed
them down the toilet.
Julissa, hearing the appellant killing the
hamsters, awoke and came into the front room. She then started to
act strangely:
[The appellant]: And she started talking in
like, demonized - like, she was looking at me, like, weird.
[Police detective]: Give me an example of what
she was saying.
A: Like (descriptive sound). She was, like,
acting weird, like - I don't know. I can't do it like she did.
Q: She was only making sounds; she wasn't
saying anything?
A: She was making sounds, and then she was,
like - and she doesn't know English. I was, like (speaking Spanish).
Q: Who were you talking to?
A: To her. She was two people in one. Camacho
had awoken by this point and was watching the scene herself. The
appellant asked Julissa who she was, because she was acting like
someone else, and she told the appellant she was his grandmother.
He began to speak with Julissa as if she was his grandmother, and
Julissa would respond:
[The appellant]: ...so I asked her, "Is it you,
Grandma?" She said, "Yes." "What did you do with my daughter?" She
goes, "She's right there," like she was inside my other girl, like
Mary Jane. I said, "What do you mean? That's Mary Jane, that's not
you." "No." I said to her, like, she was trying to give me - like
tell me, but she couldn't say it, like, "Yo es ella, y ella es
yo."
[Police detective]: What she was trying to tell
you, was that she was -
A: She was in her body -
Q: That your grandmother was in Julissa's body?
A: Yes.
Q: And Julissa's body was in -
A: In Mary Jane's body.
Q: - Mary Jane's body?
A: Uh-huh. The appellant seemed to resign
himself to the fact that his grandmother was possessing his
daughter's body, although it was "a little weird." He went into
the kitchen to make something to eat, but he started to feel woozy,
so he went back into the front room. He then saw Julissa cutting
the tape off of an electrical outlet, which the appellant had put
over the outlet to prevent the children from hurting themselves.
He said it appeared to him that Julissa was cutting the tape with
a pair of scissors, and then trying to give the scissors to John
so that he could stick them in the outlet and electrocute himself.
The appellant had taken John out of his crib at some point earlier.
The appellant said he believed his
grandmother's spirit, possessing Julissa's body, was attempting to
harm John. He shook Julissa and blew in her face, in an attempt to
cast the grandmother out. He then put John back in his crib and
began to choke Julissa. He thought he had succeeded in casting out
the grandmother's spirit, but in fact Julissa either passed out or
died because the appellant was choking her. He then called to her
and she revived, but began to say that she wanted to harm the
children, to make them and him suffer.
Camacho had entered the room at some point
while the appellant was choking Julissa. After Julissa revived and
spoke, the appellant asked Camacho to hold Julissa down while he
choked her. He said Camacho did so, but that Julissa "didn't want
to die." He then told Camacho to go to the kitchen and bring him a
knife, which she did, returning with two knives. The appellant
then stabbed Julissa several times in the chest. He then turned
her over and stabbed her in the back of the head because he wanted
to remove her brain. He said Camacho was holding down Julissa's
feet and legs but turning her head away to avoid seeing what was
happening. Over the next five to ten minutes, the appellant cut
off Julissa's head with the kitchen knife. He said Julissa's lips
were still moving and talking, and this scared him so he separated
the head from the body. He eventually put Julissa's body in the
kitchen sink so he could wash it.
The appellant then noticed Mary Jane looking at
him, and he said to Camacho, "She's next because she's also
possessed, they're - all three together." He then choked Mary
Jane, and she seemed to die more easily, but she then revived just
as Julissa had. Mary Jane began to laugh, and he started laughing
with her, which suggested to him that something was wrong. He then
decided to decapitate Mary Jane as well. After doing so, he
brought her body into the kitchen, where he proceeded to "cleanse"
the girls' bodies by pouring water into their throats where they
had been cut.
(18)
Camacho's
Statements
Camacho made three statements to the police,
two written and one videotaped, that were all offered and admitted
by the State during its case-in-chief at the guilt-innocence phase.
As noted above, Camacho invoked her Fifth Amendment rights and was
thus unavailable for cross-examination.
Camacho gave the first statement on the evening
of March 11, 2003, the same day as the murders. It was read to the
jury by Detective Chris Ortiz of the Brownsville Police Department,
the same person to whom the statement was made. Her statement
largely corroborated the appellant's, although it gave more
background information than the appellant's. For example, she told
of how the children had been sick with fever for the three days
leading up to the murders. She said the day before the murders, a
woman they saw while riding the bus gave John a piece of candy.
The appellant believed the woman cast a spell on the children,
causing them to be sick. When they returned home, the appellant
had her break an egg in a glass of water, and the way in which the
egg yolk floated told them that someone had done something bad to
Julissa. She also mentioned the appellant's mother coming to the
house that night, and the appellant and his mother discussing
using the powers of witchcraft to help the children.
There was some inconsistency between the
appellant's statement and Camacho's, however. For instance,
Camacho said the appellant claimed to see possession in both girls
simultaneously, and he strangled both girls simultaneously while
she held them down. Camacho said, "Mary Jane started staring right
at my eyes, real bad, like with anger, and evil at the same time."
Camacho also said the appellant killed Mary Jane first, then
Julissa, and he did so only by cutting off their heads - she did
not mention him stabbing Julissa first. She then tells of killing
John in the same manner.
Camacho then said after all three children were
killed, she and the appellant took a shower together. The
appellant told her he was dying, and so they should make love for
the last time, which they did. Afterwards, he told her again he
was dying, after which she tried to cut her wrist because she did
not want to live without her husband and children. The appellant
gradually started to feel better, and so Camacho told him she
wanted to bury the children. They gathered the children's bodies,
along with the knife they used, into a trash bag for that purpose.
Shortly afterwards, the appellant's brother
showed up at the house, discovered what had happened, and called
the police. Camacho said when Detective Ortiz asked her at the
scene why the floor of her apartment was wet, she told him, "I
cleaned the floor before and after we killed the babies." When
Ortiz asked her why the door off the kitchen to the outside had
been nailed shut, she said the appellant had done so before
killing the children "because we didn't want anyone or any bad
spirits to come in through that door."
Camacho gave her second statement the following
morning, on March 12th, to Detective Thomas Clipper of the
Brownsville Police Department, who read it to the jury at trial.
In that statement, Camacho said she wanted to tell the detectives
the "real reason" her children were killed. She said specifically,
I would like to start saying that yesterday I
told the detectives that witchcraft was the reason that John and I
killed our children. That was not true. The reason that we decided
to kill the children was because of money problems.
Camacho then told of how the family had been
having financial difficulties, particularly in paying the rent.
Consistent with the appellant's statement, she said the day before
the murders, they received notice that the family's food stamp
benefits were about to end because Julissa's social security
number did not match up with her birth certificate. By the morning
of March 11th, with no money for food or clothing for the three
children, and upon learning they would not be able to stay with
the appellant's brother in the event they were evicted from their
apartment, Camacho and the appellant discussed the situation and
decided it would be "better for the children to die than to suffer."
Her account of how they killed the children
more or less matched up with that of the first statement, except
that Camacho said she witnessed the appellant kill the hamsters as
well. She said that when the appellant told her he wanted to cut
the children's heads off, she asked him why. He replied, "Because
. . . we had no money. No way to take care of them. It is better
that they go with God." She said again that they killed the girls
first, and about two hours later they decided to kill John because
they did not want him to suffer alone.
Camacho gave her third statement to Detective
Sam Lucio (along with Clipper), on the evening of March 13th. The
statement was videotaped, and the tape was played for the jury at
trial. The jury also received a transcript of the tape to refer to
as they watched. In the third statement, Camacho gave more
background on her life and how she and the appellant met, and her
story more or less matches with his. She again told of the money
problems they were having in the days leading up to the murders,
but when asked directly if the appellant had prostituted himself
for money during that time she replied, "No."
The detective asked Camacho about the two
conflicting prior statements she had given about the murders and
asked that she now give a true account. Camacho's answer
incorporated both prior motives given. She repeated the story
about their difficulties with the rent money just before the
murders, and she added that the children were suffering because,
among other things, the apartment they lived in apparently had no
water or electrical service. Yet she also said the night before
the murders, she and the appellant felt "strange" and "weird." She
said the appellant killed the hamsters the next morning "because
we thought they were bringing evil" and it was contributing to the
children's suffering. She again said the appellant nailed the
kitchen door shut in order to ward off "bad spirits."
Overall, Camacho spoke often in the third
statement of the children's suffering, but it is unclear if she
meant they suffered because of the family's financial problems or
because they were possessed, as she and the appellant seemed to
believe they were:
[The Detective]: Were the children hungry?
[Camacho]: I would give them milk. To Julissa,
I would ask her, and she would say that she was not hungry, that
she was not hungry. She was unable to talk. She could not talk.
She would just do like this, but she would not say anything. She
couldn't say anything.
Q: And then what happened?
A: What happened? We decided the best thing to
do would be to do whatwe did, because I
would see that the children were suffering a lot.
Q: So they would not suffer?
A: Uh-huh.
Q: What type of suffering were the children
having?
A: They could not sleep. They would wake up and
they would be scared.
Q: Only that night?
A: No. They had been like that for a while.
Q: Was that the first night that things were
weird?
A: The first night that things were weird, but
there were some days in which the children were like that.
Q: But this is the first time that you thought
that there was something strange?
A: Yes.
Q: And that's why he killed the hamsters. And
then you said that in order for the children not to suffer - was
it your idea or his idea?
A: Both of us.
Q: Both of you?
A: Uh-huh.
Q: Were you talking about it?
A: Yes.
Camacho's account in the third statement of how
the children were killed largely matches the other two. She says
she did not see the appellant stab Julissa, but also that she was
looking away, and she does not deny that he stabbed her. She said
that when they were discovered by the appellant's brother, the
appellant told him, "that we didn't want to do it, that he didn't
want to kill them, that he only wanted the children to be well."
She also repeated the story about the interaction with the woman
on the bus the day before.
One new detail that Camacho mentioned in the
third statement was that she and the appellant planned to "go away"
after they buried the children. When asked about it, her answers
were the last portion of the statement:
[Police Sergeant]: You said that you were going
to go away. Why is it that you said you were going to go away?
[Camacho]: Because we were afraid. I didn't
want to lose my husband again, since he had gone to jail before. I
was afraid because I had never been in jail before.
Q: You felt like you were going to jail?
A: Yes, because we did something wrong.
Q: And your husband knew that he had done wrong?
A: Yes, we knew.
Q: Both of you knew that you had done wrong.
What did you do that was wrong?
A: We did wrong in killing the children, in the
way - in that way, with the government. I only thought that the
children were not going to suffer anymore. That's the only thing I
had in my mind. I didn't have in mind that we were going to jail
until the end.
Q: Thank you.
Analysis
Because Camacho was an accomplice to the
murders, and both the appellant's common-law wife as well as the
mother of the victims, any testimony she gave at trial was likely
to be compelling. That does not foreclose our analysis, however.
If the record shows, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Camacho's
erroneously admitted statements did not contribute to the guilty
verdict, then that constitutional error was harmless.
Here, because the appellant pleaded not guilty
by reason of insanity, the primary issue to be resolved at trial
was the appellant's state of mind when he committed the murders.
That is, whether the appellant, at the time of the conduct charged,
as a result of severe mental disease or defect, did not know that
his conduct was wrong.
(19) Of all the
witnesses presented by the State, Camacho was in the best position
by far to refute the appellant's contention that he was insane.
And her statements do precisely that - particularly the second
statement, in which she plainly states that the reason they killed
the children was not because of witchcraft, but because of money.
Even more troubling, of all the witnesses
presented by the State, Camacho had the most incentive to be less
than truthful, because she herself was directly involved in the
children's murders. In fact, the original capital indictment named
Camacho and the appellant as co-defendants, before their causes
were later severed. The testimony of accomplices is discussed in
Crawford as one of the "core testimonial statements that
the Confrontation Clause plainly meant to exclude."
(20) In this case,
Camacho's statements directly refute the appellant's only real
defense. Moreover, she made three statements to the police, all of
which contradict each other to some extent. The lack of
opportunity for the appellant to cross-examine her, therefore, had
a devastating effect on his case.
The State, in its brief, contends the
erroneously admitted statements were not so harmful, or at least
not harmful enough to merit reversal. The State makes its argument
in the context of Shelby v. State,
(21) which
describes a test for determining harm in Confrontation Clause
cases. Although Shelby pre-dates Crawford, we
will address the State's arguments in turn.
First, the State contends that Camacho's
statement was relatively insignificant, in that it was far
outweighed by the other evidence presented, particularly the
appellant's own statement in which he admits killing the children.
The State submits that, in light of the substantial evidence of
the appellant's culpability, Camacho's statement was unnecessary
to establish his guilt.
As stated above, however, the issue at trial
was not really the appellant's responsibility for the children's
deaths. The appellant freely admitted that he killed the children.
Instead, the issue was whether the defendant was legally insane.
His own statement supported a finding of insanity, in that he
spoke extensively of demonic possession and "evil" in the children
that caused him to commit the murders. Camacho's second statement
directly contradicts that argument, by asserting that she and the
appellant killed the children because of money problems. Worse,
Camacho says in her third statement that the appellant "knew" that
what he had done was "wrong," which directly refutes the legal
definition of insanity. Given Camacho's unique position as both
accomplice to the crime and direct witness to the appellant's
motivations, her specific, detailed testimony obviously had great
significance.
The State also dismisses the importance of
Camacho's statement as being merely cumulative of other evidence,
and corroborated by the appellant's own statement. Yet the record
shows this to be true only as to the facts of the murders
themselves, namely, the methods employed and the chronology. As to
the more important issue - the appellant's motive - there are
clear discrepancies between the appellant's statement and those of
Camacho. And, even if Camacho's statement matches with the
appellant's, that does not change the fact that Camacho herself
was facing indictment for capital murder when she spoke with the
police. Obviously then, she could have been under some pressure to
modify her story, given her own participation in the murders. That
is precisely the type of issue the appellant was not able to
address on cross-examination.
The State further argues that Camacho's
statement was of little importance because the appellant had
admitted responsibility for the murders, and the substance of
Camacho's statement was shown to be "accurate" by corroborating
forensic and DNA evidence. Again, however, Camacho's statement can
only be said to be accurate as to the grisly details of the murder
itself. It cannot be said that her statement was "accurate" as to
the appellant's motives because she gives at least two conflicting
motives for the appellant's actions.
The State also argues that any harm caused by
not cross-examining Camacho was cured at least in part by the
opportunity to cross-examine other State's witnesses, such as the
officers who interrogated Camacho and later read her statements to
the jury. Even if this were true, it is clear under Crawford
that the statements of accomplices are normally particularly
harmful. And it is difficult to see how cross-examining the
interrogating officers, who can only speculate as to Camacho's
motives and influences to testify, would have anywhere near the
same effect as cross-examining Camacho herself.
Finally, the State contends the prosecution's
case was strong overall, even without Camacho's statements. Again,
however, the State focuses on the evidence which proves the
appellant's actual participation in the murders, such as his own
statement and the physical evidence corroborating his and
Camacho's accounts of the murders. That evidence is indeed
overwhelming. Yet the crucial evidence to rebut the appellant's
contention that he was not guilty by reason of insanity came
almost exclusively from one source: Camacho's statements.
Camacho, who was not only at the scene but by
her own admission was an accomplice, told the jury (as read by
Clipper): "The reason that we decided to kill the children was
because of money problems." Later, she told the jury (in her
videotaped statement) that she and the appellant "knew" they had
"done wrong." No physical evidence presented at trial could
corroborate these statements. On the other hand, there were many
factors that could have affected the statements' accuracy,
including Camacho's own pending prosecution for her involvement in
the murders, her state of mind due to the horrific acts in which
she had just participated, and her mental competency, given that
she was a high school dropout with at least some time spent in
special education courses. It is obviously not for this court to
say whether Camacho's statements were accurate or not. Yet we can
say that her statements likely contributed to the jury's verdict
of guilt, such that the error in admitting her statements at trial
clearly prejudiced the appellant's case. We sustain point of error
one.Conclusion
Having sustained the appellant's first point of
error, we need not address the other eleven. We reverse the
verdict of guilt and remand this cause to the trial court.
17. Satterwhite, 486
U.S., at 258-59 (quoting Chapman, 386 U.S., at 24).
18. There was presumably
more of the video statement to be shown (i.e., describing John's
murder), but there was apparently a dispute over the transcription/translation
and ultimately the jury only saw the video up to this point.
See Reporter's Record Vols. 22: 278; 23:3-7.
(4.2 Mb)