Execution nears for ’91 Pasadena slayings
Man repeatedly released on parole was convicted of killing 2 brothers in their home
A man is scheduled to be executed Tuesday for the 1991 double homicide of two brothers who were stabbed to death while sleeping in their Pasadena home.
If no stay is granted for Rick Allan Rhoades, 57, his death penalty case will be Harris County’s first to reach the chamber in more than two years. Rhoades’ capital case has stretched on decades longer: A jury convicted him in 1992 for the murders of Charles and Bradley Allen, which occurred less than 24 hours after Rhoades was released on parole.
An execution could mark the end of a nightmarish chapter for the Allen family, who has for 30 years seen Rhoades’ name resurface in letters about his attempts to be free from death row.
“I will be happy for the day when there are no more appeals,” said Janice Andrews, the Allens’ sister. “We just want it over.”
Rhoades’ trial garnered massive attention in the early ’90s, partly because of his criminal history and repeat releases on parole. He had previously served four prison sentences in Indiana and Texas, mostly for home and auto burglaries.
The former laborer had served three years of a five-year sentence for burglary at the time of his latest parole date. Police found bloody footprints but no usable fingerprints at the scene and were still looking for a suspect until Rhoades’ arrest on a different charge the next month.
After being caught for a burglary and VCR theft at a Pasadena elementary school, he told police he had information on a double homicide and was “tired of running,” according to Chronicle reports.
“I’m just madder than hell,” Emma Allen, mother of the two slain men, said after Rhodes’ arrest. “It just seems to be the same old thing. Guys getting out of prison who should have been in jail for life.”
Rhoades’ attorneys did not respond to requests for comment. His case was appealed last week to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a federal judge dis
missed a complaint against state District Judge Ana Martinez, who said she didn’t have jurisdiction to decide on a motion that would have granted his attorneys access to juror information.
U.S. District Judge David Hittner also denied Rhoades a stay of execution.
The crime
After his release on parole in 1991, Rhoades took a bus to Houston instead of a halfway house, court documents show.
Prosecutors and defense attorneys sparred on the details of what happened next, although Rhoades admitted to the Sept. 13 killings.
State attorneys said Charles Allen, 31, and Bradley Allen, 33, went to bed after an eventful night and past several weeks: They had just hosted a party to watch a football game between the University of Houston and the University of Miami, and they were celebrating the opening of a recording studio as well as a recent move into their new home — on their childhood street.
Prosecutors argued that Rhoades broke into the home to burglarize it and stabbed the brothers in the process, according to articles about the trial.
His defense attorneys claimed Rhoades acted in self-defense. When he confessed, he told police he was drinking beer the night of the slayings and walked by the Allen brothers’ home because he planned to live in a vacant apartment he found nearby.
Rhoades said he found himself involved in a “staring match” with one of the brothers, who told him to leave the area. He refused, and Charles Allen ran into his house, Rhoades told police.
Fearing that the new homeowner was going to grab a firearm, Rhoades followed him inside, he said at the time. A fight ensued, and Charles Allen was stabbed to death. Bradley Allen was awakened by the fight and killed when he confronted Rhoades, according to the account shared with police.
The men were discovered in the home the next day, stabbed multiple times with a butcher knife. Charles Allen was also beaten with a weight bar. Cash and a set of car keys were stolen during the burglary.
Rhoades later told police he left the house to shower in an unoccupied apartment, first changing into clothes he took from the Allens.
Appeals going nowhere
Defense lawyers at the 1992 trial presented evidence that Rhoades had been severely abused by his parents before he was adopted at age 4. They also blamed his criminal behavior on the emotional trauma he suffered as a young child as well as a brain malfunction that affects his judgment and impulse control.
Those issues have not been the subject of appeals. Rhoades, who claimed at the time to have a 140 IQ, argued that the convicting court unconstitutionally permitted the jury to hear testimony about the possibility of release on furlough for capital defendants sentenced to life in prison, according to court documents.
Rhoades’ trial took place years after the highprofile Willie Horton case, in which a man serving a life sentence for murder left prison on a Massachusetts weekend furlough program and didn’t return. Before being captured, he committed assault, armed robbery and rape — which were mentioned in a controversial George H.W. Bush presidential campaign ad in 1988.
The appeals didn’t change the course of the case. Most recently, defense attorneys Jeffrey Newberry and David Dow have fought for access to juror information, believing that two potential jurors might have been struck from the panel in a discriminatory manner.
Martinez, the district judge now presiding over the court, did not take up the case because she struggled with jurisdiction.
Rhoades is one of 74 people with Harris County cases on death row, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. His is one of the oldest, however.
30 years later
Several of the Allens’ family members are expected to be at the execution Tuesday, including a daughter of Bradley Allen who was not yet born at the time of the murders.
She followed in the profession of her father, who was a graphic artist, said Andrews, the sister. Charles Allen was an operator for a chemical company and an aspiring musician with a home full of recording equipment.
Their loved ones were steadfast during the twoweek trial, with about 30 of them attending each day. The Allens left behind three brothers and a sister, all of whom are now in their 60s. Their mother is also still alive.
The tight-knit family chose to move on with their lives after the stabbings, but the deaths still took their toll.
After 30 years, the edges of grief have softened a bit, Andrews said. Rhoades’ execution won’t make her feel better, though she hopes it will provide an end to ongoing case developments that remind her of her brothers’ brutal deaths.
Andrews said she is personally liberal and uncertain on the death penalty as an issue but at least knows there isn’t a question that Rhoades killed her siblings.
“I’ve seen so many wrongfully convicted people go to death row,” she said. “That’s not the situation here.”