Judge to hear mental evaluation of child killer facing new charges
A judge is scheduled to receive the results of a psychiatric evaluation regarding convicted child killer Genene Jones at a hearing today.
Jones, 67, a former nurse who worked at hospitals in San Antonio and for a Kerrville pediatrician in the 1980s, was convicted in 1984 of killing 15-month-old Chelsea McClellan in 1982 by injecting her with an overdose of muscle relaxers at a doctor’s office in Kerrville.
The former pediatric nurse was sentenced to 99 years in prison in that case and was also found guilty of injury to a child for attempting to overdose Rolando Santos in San Antonio. The child lived. She was sentenced to 60 years in the Santos case, and both terms were served at the same time.
Because of a law designed to ease prison crowding, Jones was to be released March 2018.
Under Nicholas LaHood, former Bexar County district attorney, Jones was indicted in 2017 on five new charges.
She’s accused in the deaths of Joshua Sawyer on Dec. 12, 1981; Richard “Ricky” Nelson, 8 months, who died July 3, 1981; Patrick Zavala, 4 months, who died Jan. 17, 1982; Rosemary Vega, 2 years old, who died Sept. 16, 1981; and Paul Villarreal, who was 3 months old when he died Sept. 24, 1981.
LaHood estimated she could be responsible for up to 60 deaths.
Jones has pleaded not guilty. If convicted, she faces life in prison.
The hearing will be held in Criminal Magistrate Court, with Judge Andrew Carruthers presiding.