Mum on death row sparks calls for mercy from Kim Kardashian
Melissa Lucio’s execution is scheduled for 27 April – but did she get a fair trial and is she guilty of murdering her daughter?
At around 7pm on 17 February 2007, Harlingen Police Department got a 911 call – an unresponsive little girl had been found at an apartment complex in the central region of the Rio Grande Valley, Texas. When paramedics got to the scene, they discovered two-year-old Mariah Alvarez lying on a filthy living room floor and her mother standing nearby. The tot wasn’t breathing and despite medics’ best efforts, she was pronounced dead upon arrival at hospital.
Within minutes of staff trying to determine how the youngster had died, police were involved. Mariah had visible bruising all over her body, bite marks on her back and patches of hair missing.
Before an autopsy was even carried out, mum Melissa Lucio was arrested. A year later, she was convicted of murdering her little girl and sentenced to death. Fourteen years on, the 53-year-old is still being held at Mountain View Unit prison, Gatesville, and her execution is due to take place on 27 April – when she is set to become the first Latina put to death in Texas.
But some have questioned her punishment and earlier this month Kim Kardashian spoke out. Over the past few years, the reality TV star, 41, has become an outspoken advocate for prison reform and she is now pleading for clemency in Lucio’s case.
Kim shared a letter to the Governor of Texas from Lucio’s family, including son John, begging him to spare her. Talking to her 72 million Twitter followers, she made it clear she believes Lucio is innocent, saying, “I read about the case
of Melissa Lucio and wanted to share her story with you.
“She has been on death row for over 14 years for her daughter’s death, which was a tragic accident. It’s stories like Melissa’s that make me speak so loud about the death penalty in general and why it should be banned when innocent people are suffering.”
At the time of Mariah’s death, Lucio had 12 children – nine of whom lived with her and
her boyfriend
Robert Alvarez – and was pregnant with twin boys. When detectives looking into the case spoke to the paramedics who first attended the scene, they said Lucio couldn’t explain exactly what had happened to Mariah, or how she had come to be unresponsive on the floor.
The medics also noted that Lucio seemed disconnected and stood to the side, watching while they tried to save her girl’s life.
Filthy & poverty-stricken
It later transpired that all of the children, including Mariah, had been removed from the home by Child Protective Services almost two years earlier, when Mariah was just weeks old. They had only been returned to Lucio’s care three months before Mariah’s tragic death.
In the CPS report, an investigator described the house as being in a “terrible condition” with rubbish strewn everywhere, mattresses lying on the floor and a strong smell of urine. All of the children were covered in bedbug bites and most had bruises on their bodies.
There was also a very limited supply of food – not enough for one meal for one person, let alone 12 children and two adults.
Poverty-stricken Lucio later stated that she relied on local food banks and soup kitchens to feed her family. When Lucio was taken in for
questioning, she claimed her daughter had sustained her injuries after falling down the stairs two days earlier. This story was later backed up by one of Lucio’s children, who said they’d seen Mariah fall and then witnessed her acting “tired” afterwards.
Lucio’s initial interrogation lasted between five and seven hours. She claims that during that time, she did not have a lawyer present and was left without food or water – despite being pregnant with the twins.
The interviewing officers are alleged to have threatened her, berated her parenting and repeatedly showed her pictures of her dead daughter. Lawyers for Lucio, who on 22 March submitted an application for clemency, claim their client had a history of suffering sexual abuse and domestic violence, and was particularly vulnerable to the male officers’ use of “coercion” during the interrogation.
Despite denying ever having abused her daughter – a statement she made more than a hundred times – Lucio eventually admitted to having occasionally spanked her.
“I guess I did it,” Lucio said, when asked by police if she was responsible for some of Mariah’s injuries.
The prosecution accepted this as a confession and during a week-long trial in 2008, Lucio was found guilty of capital murder. Alvarez got a four-year sentence for causing injury to a child by omission.
During Lucio’s trial, findings from Mariah’s autopsy were presented to the court. Doctors noted she had a broken arm at the time of her death that had already started to heal in the position it was left in, as it hadn’t been correctly set in a cast.
She also had pinch marks to her vaginal area, was severely dehydrated and had contusions to her lungs and kidneys.
Her cause of death was determined to be a blunt force trauma to the head, which caused a brain bleed.
As for Lucio’s defence during the trial, there wasn’t much of one. Her lawyer did not call any witnesses or experts on her behalf, despite other family members claiming to have seen Mariah fall, by accident, down the stairs.
Lucio came from a broken home of substance abuse and severe neglect. She had been sexually assaulted by multiple men – mostly her mum’s boyfriends – from the age of seven and eventually married a physically abusive man when she was 16.
By 26, she was a single mother to five children – and addicted to cocaine. Lucio’s 12 children ranged in age from two to 15 at the time of her arrest. She gave birth to her youngest children – the twin boys – while in jail and had to give them up for adoption. The rest of her brood were split up and either sent to live with relatives or placed in the custody of the state.
Lucio’s attorneys do not suggest that she was a good mother. They know her children were neglected – a fact that had been made clear by the CPS report.
‘A tragedy, not a murder’
However, almost every legal expert who has looked at the case retrospectively has determined that Lucio was not given a fair trial and should not have been convicted of a capital felony.
They believe she should be in prison – but not on death row.
Lucio’s attorneys are now asking Governor Greg Abbott, a member of the Republican Party and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, for her death sentence to be commuted to a lesser punishment.
Alternatively, they are asking for a 120-day reprieve from execution so that more evidence can be gathered to prove she was wrongly convicted over her daughter’s accidental death.
Professor Sandra Babcock, one of Lucio’s attorneys and the director of the Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide, said her death sentence “shows that any innocent woman can be executed” in the state.
“Mariah’s death was a tragedy, not a murder,” she added.
As efforts to help her continue, Lucio’s life hangs in the balance…