HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — A man who escaped prison in his native Mexico while serving a murder sentence was executed in Texas on Wednesday for fatally beating a former Baylor University history professor and attacking his wife more than 16 years ago.
Ramiro Hernandez-Llanas, 44, was lethally injected in the state's death chamber in Huntsville.
He was in the U.S. illegally when he was arrested for the October 1997 slaying of 49-year-old Glen Lich. Just 10 days earlier, Lich had given Hernandez-Llanas a job helping with renovations at his ranch near Kerrville, about 65 miles northwest of San Antonio, in exchange for living quarters.
Investigators said Hernandez-Llanas lured Lich from his house, then repeatedly clubbed him with a piece of steel rebar. Armed with a knife, he then attacked Lich's wife. She survived and testified against Hernandez-Llanas, who also had been linked to a rape and a stabbing.
Strapped to a hospital gurney inside the death chamber, Hernandez-Llanas asked for forgiveness and said he was at peace.
"I'm looking at the angel of God," he said, speaking in Spanish during a final statement that lasted nearly five minutes. "I ask forgiveness from the family of my boss."
He raised his head from the gurney three times and blew three loud kisses toward a brother, a sister and two friends watching through a window. He also urged his children to "take advantage of your time on earth."
As the drug took effect, he snored loudly twice, then appeared to go to sleep. Within seconds, all movement stopped. He was pronounced dead at 6:28 p.m.
Hernandez-Llanas was the second Texas inmate to receive a lethal injection of a new supply of pentobarbital. Texas Department of Criminal Justice officials have refused to identify the source of the powerful sedative, contending secrecy is needed to protect the drug's provider from threats of violence from capital punishment opponents. The U.S. Supreme Court backed the state's position in a related case last week.
Texas and other states that have the death penalty have been scrambling for substitute drugs or new sources for drugs for lethal injections after major drugmakers — many based in Europe with longtime opposition to the death penalty — stopped selling to prisons and corrections departments.
Hernandez-Llanas' appeals were exhausted, and the Texas parole board on Tuesday refused to delay his death sentence or commute it to life in prison.
http://www.chron.com/news/texas/article/Mexican-national-executed-for-1997-Texas-slaying-5389091.php?cmpid=hpbn
