Execution: Humberto Leal
David Carson
July 2011 in Huntsville, Texas for the abduction, rape, and murder of
a 16-year-old girl.
On 20 May 1994, Leal, then 21, was at an outdoor Friday night party in
San Antonio. Adria Sauceda was also at the party. According to
witnesses, Sauceda was intoxicated and partially undressed, and was in
the middle of a circle of men who were taking turns having sex with
her. One man carried her to his truck and, according to a witness,
"had his way with her". At some point, Leal told witnesses he was a
friend of Sauceda's parents and offered to take her home. The girl -
conscious but disoriented - was placed into Leal's vehicle, and Leal
drove away.
About thirty minutes later, Leal's brother arrived at the party and
excitedly yelled that Leal had come home with blood on him and said he
had killed a girl. Several of the party attendees went looking for
Sauceda. They called police after they found her nude body on a dirt
road. The observed that the victim's head was bashed in, bleeding, and
that it was flinching or jerking.
The victim had been raped with a broken stick of lumber about 14 to 16
inches long, which was still protruding from her vagina. There was a
gaping hole in her head from the corner of her right eye to the center
of her head, and blood was oozing from the hole. There was a bloody
rock by the victim's right thigh. Her left arm was under a chunk of
asphalt weighing 30 to 40 pounds.
When questioned by police, Leal had scratches and cuts on his body. He
stated that he was with Sauceda in his car when she began hitting him
and the steering wheel, causing him to hit a curb. He tried to calm
her down, but she leaped from the car and ran away. After waiting
about ten to fifteen minutes to see if she would return, he went home.
After the police informed Leal that his brother had also given a
statement, Leal gave another statement. This time, Leal claimed that
he followed Sauceda after she jumped out of the car. She attacked him,
and he pushed her away. She fell on the ground and did not get up.
Leal attempted to wake her, but could not. When he saw bubbles coming
out of her nose, he got scared and left. He said he went home, prayed,
and told family members what had happened.
Police searched Leal's house and found a blouse belonging to Sauceda
that had blood stains and hair on it. Police also found traces of
blood on the passenger door and seat of Leal's car, from blood stains
that had been wiped off.
At Leal's trial, the medical examiner testified that Sauceda died from
blows to the head. She also had signs of manual strangulation on her
neck, and three bite marks matching Leal's dental impressions on her
body. He further testified that the victim received some of her
injuries while standing up. She received her head injuries while lying
flat on her back, with the assailant standing over her.
Leal testified that as he was driving Sauceda from the party, she
directed him which way to go, but he turned in the opposite direction.
She attempted to get out of the car, but he refused to allow her to do
so. When she finally did manage to get out, he attempted to pull her
back, but she began hitting, pushing, and scratching his face. At that
point, he pushed her. He then felt something wet on the back of her
head, shook her in an attempt to wake her, and then fled in fear when
he saw bubbles coming out of her nose.
Leal had no prior prison record, but he had been accused of another
rape occurring two weeks before Sauceda's murder. In that incident,
Leal raped another teenage girl and bit her on the neck. He then
repeatedly telephoned the victim's older sister and threatened to have
her killed if she testified against him.
A jury convicted Leal of capital murder in July 1995 and sentenced him
to death. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction
and sentence in February 1998. All of his subsequent appeals in state
and federal court were denied.
Although Leal had lived in the U.S. illegally since the age of two, he
was a citizen of Mexico. According to the 1963 Vienna Convention on
Consular Relations, he had a right to contact the Mexican consulate at
the time of his arrest. Throughout his appeals, U.S. and Mexican
officials attempted to have Leal's death sentence commuted because he
was not informed of his consular rights.
In March 2005, in connection with a similar case involving Mexican
national Jose Medellin, who was convicted in the gang rape and murder
of two teenage girls, President George W. Bush ordered a review of all
U.S. death row cases involving foreign nationals to determine whether
their consular rights were respected. The Texas Court of Criminal
Appeals, however, ruled in November 2006 that Bush's directive and the
rulings of the World Court were not binding. The U.S. Supreme Court
ruled in favor of the state in March 2008 in Medellin v. Texas,
clearing the way for Medellin's execution later that year.
As Leal's execution date approached, President Obama appealed to Texas
officials to halt the execution, warning that it would violate
international law and cause "irreparable harm" to U.S. interests.
Obama warned that American citizens traveling abroad could be in
jeopardy of losing their consular rights if Leal was executed. He also
asked the U.S. Supreme Court to stay the execution because of pending
legislation in the Senate that could force states to comply with
international law.
Leal's lawyers also filed late appeals on his behalf. In their
clemency appeal to the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, they wrote,
"There can be little doubt that if the government of Mexico had been
allowed access to Mr. Leal in a timely matter, he would not now be
facing execution for a capital murder he did not commit."
As in Medellin's case, Texas did not heed the protests. Governor Rick
Perry's office released a statement that Leal was guilty of a heinous
crime and deserved to die. Stephen Hoffman of the state attorney
general's office stated, "Leal's argument is nothing but a transparent
attempt to evade his impending punishment." Others pointed out that,
as a lifelong resident of the U.S., Medellin was not a traveler in a
foreign country, and therefore his case was not the type the Vienna
convention was intended to cover.
Sauceda's mother, Rachel Terry, urged Texas to proceed with the
execution. "A technicality doesn't give anyone a right to come to this
country and rape, torture, and murder anyone," she said in a TV
interview.
The U.S. Supreme Court sided with Texas in a 5-4 decision. The court's
conservative Justices - Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito,
and Chief Justice John Roberts - were joined by swing Justice Anthony
Kennedy. In a jointly-authored or "per curiam" opinion, the majority
rejected the White House's request to stay the execution because of
the bill in the Senate. "First, we are doubtful that it is ever
appropriate to stay a lower court judgment in light of unacted
legislation. Our task is to rule on what the law is, not what it might
eventually be," the Court wrote. Referring frequently to its decisions
in the Medellin case, the Court also noted that the Obama
administration "studiously refuses to argue that Leal was prejudiced
by the Vienna Convention violation ... We decline to follow the United
States' suggestion of granting a stay to allow Leal to bring a claim
based on hypothetical legislation when it cannot even bring itself to
say that his attempt to overturn his conviction has any prospect of
success."
The four liberal Justices on the Court - Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader
Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan - dissented, anticipating
that Senator Patrick Leahy's bill could become law by the end of
September. "It is difficult to see how the State's interest in the
immediate execution of an individual convicted of capital murder 16
years ago can outweigh the considerations that support additional
delay, perhaps only until the end of the summer," Breyer wrote.
"I've hurt a lot of people," Leal said in his last statement. "I take
full blame for everything. I am sorry for what I did. May they forgive
me. Let's get this show on the road, Warden." The lethal injection was
then started. As the drug was taking effect, Leal shouted twice, "Viva
Mexico!" He was pronounced dead at 6:21 p.m.
David Carson
(Sources: Texas Attorney General's office, Texas Department of
Criminal Justice, court documents, Associated Press, CBS News, CNN,
The Guardian, Huntsville Item.)
--
Texas Execution Information
www.txexecutions.org