Summary and Analysis of The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution: Based on the Book by James S. Liebman
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Summary and Analysis of The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution: Based on the Book by James S. Liebman
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This short summary and analysis of The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution by James S. Liebman and the Columbia DeLuna Project includes:
- Historical context
- Chapter-by-chapter summaries
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- Important quotes
- Fascinating trivia
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About James S. Liebman and the Columbia DeLuna Project’s The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution:
The Wrong Carlos calls into question the United States justice system and its ability to impose the death penalty with impartiality and certainty through an in-depth examination of an obscure capital murder case from the 1980s.
In Corpus Christi, Texas, a man named Carlos DeLuna was executed for the murder of Wanda Vargas Lopez, while a man who looked just like him, Carlos Hernandez, escaped conviction for killing her and others.
Columbia Law School professor James S. Liebman and his team from the Columbia DeLuna Project delve into this case of mistaken identity to study how factors such as race, poverty, and reliance upon eyewitness testimony can contribute to erroneous death penalty convictions.
In a country where capital punishment remains controversial, The Wrong Carlos asks its readers to consider whether irreversible conviction at the hands of a flawed system is the type of justice Americans want to see served.
The summary and analysis in this ebook are intended to complement your reading experience and bring you closer to a great work of nonfiction.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781504044110 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Worth Books |
| Publication date: | 02/07/2017 |
| Series: | Smart Summaries |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 30 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
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Summary and Analysis of The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution
Based on the Book by James S. Liebman and the Columbia DeLuna Project
By Worth Books
OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA
Copyright © 2017 Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-5040-4411-0
CHAPTER 1
Summary
Preface
The authors of The Wrong Carlos recap Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's stated belief that there has never been a proven case of a convict wrongfully executed by the US criminal justice system. In researching the case of Carlos DeLuna, the authors compiled a large amount of data that they have made available on the internet and in their book,The Wrong Carlos. They intend to present the evidence as clearly as possible, hoping their readers can decide for themselves whether or not Carlos DeLuna was wrongfully executed. Only at the end of the book will they give their own interpretation.
Prologue
In 1863, a woman was hanged in Texas for murder. She insisted with her dying words that she was innocent, and in 1985, the state government exonerated her of the crime. She remains the only person the state admits to wrongfully killing. Since her death, Texas has gone on to execute more people than any other state. One of them being Carlos DeLuna. He was convicted of stabbing a young woman to death.
The reverend who spent DeLuna's last day with him came to believe that Carlos had a childlike view of the world, that he was likely innocent of the murder, and that he possibly suffered during the lethal injection.
Carlos DeLuna looked a lot like another man from the same town — Carlos Hernandez. Hernandez had a violent history, but never remained in jail for very long despite his many convictions. His usual weapon was a knife, and his usual victim was a woman. The murder for which DeLuna was executed, in fact, fit Hernandez's pattern perfectly.
Part I: The Death of Wanda Lopez
1. Murder
On February 4, 1983, a tweny-four-year-old woman named Wanda Jean Vargas Lopez was murdered while working alone in a gas station convenience store. Wanda was a single mother who lived with her parents and five-year-old daughter in Corpus Christi, Texas. Her parents and brother, Richard Vargas, worried about her working alone at the Sigmor Shamrock in a rough part of town. Their fears were validated the night they learned that Wanda had been stabbed in her left breast, puncturing her lung. She was dead. The Vargases were sent home with no other information; they were surprised and disturbed later that night to hear a recording of Wanda's final 911 call on the news. Listening to Wanda's last words and screams increased their distress, and infuriated Richard: Instead of sending help immediately, the dispatcher questioned her until she moaned in pain and lost hold of the phone.
Need to Know: Wanda Lopez was murdered on February 4, 1983, in Corpus Christi, Texas. Even though she was working alone at gas station in a dangerous part of town, police did not respond immediately to her call for assistance.
2. Manhunt
The police assembled four eyewitnesses from the scene of the crime. Each of them described a Hispanic man of similar height and build, but otherwise their descriptions differed. Kevan Baker, the only person who witnessed the attack, described a transient-looking man with an unshaven face, jeans, and a flannel shirt. George Aguirre, who first warned Wanda that a man was standing outside with a knife, described a similar man with a gray sweatshirt. John and Julie Arsuaga, who saw a man jogging past their car a few blocks east of the gas station, described him as clean-shaven, wearing a pressed white button-down shirt and dress pants. The officer who broadcasted these descriptions to other police noted at first that the witnesses might be describing two different men, but eventually conflated the descriptions into a single, inaccurate portrait.
Meanwhile, the police spent about thirty minutes following a man who was running to the north and west — the direction Baker had seen the attacker take off toward — until they lost his trail. A woman called 911 to report that a man was hiding under her truck a few blocks east of the gas station. Minutes later, police arrived in her driveway and pulled a man out from under the truck: Carlos DeLuna.
Need to Know: Most of the information contained in this chapter came from a tape recording that contained Wanda's 911 call and the forty-one minutes that the police spent following not one, but two suspects. The manhunt portion of the tape went unheard by anyone outside law enforcement until 2005, when CDP investigators contacted Jesse Escochea, the police dispatcher who had answered Wanda's call. He had made a personal recording of the call and the manhunt to keep as a souvenir.
3. Show-up
When the police caught DeLuna, they were certain they had caught the killer. The officers brought their suspect back to the Sigmor for a show-up identification. Witnesses were asked to identify the suspect face-to-face instead of participating in a more traditional lineup. At first, all the witnesses refused to comply; they were afraid to come face-to-face with a suspected murderer. Baker and Aguirre relented to pressure from police on the scene and confirmed that DeLuna was the man they'd seen earlier. The Arsuagas still refused, and later chose DeLuna from a photo lineup.
In 2004, a CDP investigator interviewed Baker about his identification of DeLuna at the Sigmor station, and later in court. Baker admitted that he had felt compelled to give a positive ID even though he could only describe himself as about 70% certain about the accuracy of his statement. When asked why, he cited difficulty (as a Caucasian man) in telling Hispanic men apart, and having felt influenced by knowing that the man had been found hiding under a car.
Need to Know: Baker didn't trust his ability to tell the difference between Hispanic men, but noticed a definite difference in the well-groomed appearance of DeLuna compared to the transient appearance of the man he saw leaving the gas station, which he pointed out in his court testimony and brought up again in 2004.
4. Crime Scene
After the show-up ID was finished, the crowd at the station dispersed. Only four people were left behind: Detective Olivia Escobedo, ID technician Joel Infante, store manager Robert Stange, and his boss, Pete Gonzalez.
Lots of blood and evidence of a struggle were obvious even from the parking lot. Stange was upset and confused: Wanda was a conscientious employee who knew that the rule during a robbery was to hand over whatever the thief wanted. Inside the store, he was more confused to see bills scattered around the register. According to store policy, the register would have had no more than $75 inside, and $55 was still there. It seemed clear to Stange that theft was not the motive for Wanda's murder, but once he had explained the cash drop and the store's inventory system, the police didn't question him further. Less than two hours after they had arrived on the scene, Escobedo and Infante left. Stange and Gonzalez cleaned up, and Stange opened the store for business at six the next morning.
Need to Know: The inventory conducted after Wanda's murder showed the store to be $166 short, which was not unusual. It was not possible to determine if the difference was a loss of cash or merchandise, but the prosecutors later used this figure to explain the $149 found in DeLuna's pocket (even though it was neatly rolled up, blood-free, and consistent with what he had been paid for work that week).
5. Suspect
Carlos DeLuna was the eighth of ten children born to Margarita Martinez, a poor and uneducated woman who mostly expected her children to raise themselves. DeLuna struggled with classwork and his teachers reported learning disabilities beginning when he was in elementary school. Before ninth grade, he dropped out and started serving stints in juvenile detention. Even though he was often in trouble, his sister Rose recalled his good heart, and the way he would bring her food from his job. He was known for his particular way of dressing, in black pants and dress shirts, with a clean-shaved face and neat hair. Rose thought of him as a follower, apt to find trouble mostly because others led him to it.
DeLuna eventually stole a car and went to jail for two years. After his release, he almost immediately violated his parole by assaulting Juanita Garcia, his friend's mother. He returned to jail for sixteen months before finding himself back in Corpus Christi. He frequently antagonized the police and got arrested for public intoxication, but his mother always did whatever she could to bail him out. Throughout his multiple arrests, DeLuna was never caught carrying a weapon.
Need to Know: DeLuna was tested for and recorded as having learning disabilities from a young age, but when he was examined by court psychologists in 1983 they claimed he was manipulating them. His lawyers never looked for past records to prove them wrong.
Part II: The Lives of Carlos Hernandez
6. Probation and Parole
In 1983, people around Corpus Christi knew Carlos Hernandez for the way he looked (sloppy and unshaven, wearing jeans, sweatshirts, and flannels) and the cherished knife he always carried (a lock-blade buck knife), but mostly they knew to be afraid. Hernandez was a twenty-nine-year-old who had a history of committing violent crimes and abusing women. He had already spent years in jail for a series of armed robberies in convenience stores, and he had been married twice. The fear Hernandez struck in people gave him a sort of attractive power as well: He could get people to do what he wanted, at least for a while.
Carlos's mother, Fidela, was known to be a nasty woman with whom he frequently clashed. In fact, the only woman toward whom Hernandez showed affection was his sister, Paula Schilling, and that affection was generally expressed through violence as well. Hernandez hated her husband, Freddy Schilling, and often fought and threatened him, especially when Schilling had an affair and temporarily ran off with a woman named Dahlia Sauceda.
On November 20, 1979, Dahlia Sauceda was found dead. Her body was discovered inside her van with her two-year-old sleeping on the car seat next to her. She had been strangled and an "X" was carved into her back.
Need to Know: The primary reason for Hernandez's commitment to Paula was guilt: When he was sixteen years old, he was driving drunk and caused an accident that killed her first fiancé. Aside from Paula, Hernandez seemed more driven to harm women than to protect them.
7. Acquittal
A nineteen-year-old named Jesse Garza was arrested for Dahlia Sauceda's murder on the word of his friend Pedro Olivarez, who claimed to have seen Garza kill her. But Garza insisted to his lawyer, Albert Peña, that he was innocent. Peña managed to get Garza acquitted by constructing a convincing case against Carlos Hernandez, whose fingerprint and boxer shorts had been found in the van along with Dahlia's body. Hernandez eluded charges for the murder until 1986, when an ex-girlfriend came to the police with news of a confession and a confidential detail from Hernandez: He had cut off Dahlia's toe and kept it as a souvenir. Hernandez was arrested and sat in jail until he got his lucky break — attorney Jon Kelly. Assigned to defend Hernandez, Kelly requested evidence from the DA's office that they failed to produce. As a result, Kelly moved for the case to be dismissed and the judge granted his request.
Need to Know: Dahlia Sauceda's killer was almost certainly Carlos Hernandez. Pedro Olivarez admitted in court that he had lied about Garza killing Sauceda. He only told CDP investigators that he knew Hernandez was the killer after he saw Hernandez's death certificate, because Hernandez had threatened to kill him and his family if he told.
8. Confession
Pricilla Hernandez was thirteen when she ran away from her grandmother Fidela's house, but she had already endured years of abuse and molestation from her grandmother and her uncle Carlos. In addition to being mistreated, Pricilla had overheard a confession from Hernandez about killing a woman named Wanda. She wasn't the only one that heard him talk about the crime. Janie Adrian, a neighbor, heard Hernandez say that he'd stabbed a woman and his "stupid tocayo took the blame for it" By tocayo, he meant Carlos DeLuna, who resembled him and shared his name.
When Pricilla left Fidela's house, she lived for a while with her father, Beto Vela, and his wife at the time, Linda Perales. Perales knew of Hernandez and heard all about his violence from Pricilla. Later, she married Manuel DeLuna, Carlos's older brother. It wasn't until then, in 1998, that she made the connection between the two men and Wanda's murder.
Need to Know: Numerous people heard Hernandez confess or allude to killing Wanda (and suggest that DeLuna had taken the fall for him), but none ever notified law enforcement. Even in the company of violent men like Hernandez, the community had little faith in police.
9. Mistaken Identity
Eddie Garza, a police sergeant in Corpus Christi, had also heard the rumor that Hernandez was Wanda's murderer from many of his informants around town. Garza claims he gave Hernandez's name to Detective Escobedo months before DeLuna gave the same name to his defenders, but didn't know if she ever investigated the man further. Hernandez was, in fact, arrested in April 1983 and held on a warrant for an outstanding traffic ticket while the police gathered a new set of fingerprints and mug shots from him. He was released a few days later.
Hernandez was lucky when it came to punishment for his crimes. He was arrested and released frequently for smaller infractions, such as public intoxication; but his offenses were often more serious — threatening ex-girlfriends and their children with knives and axes. No matter what he did, his constant state of parole was rarely revoked; Garza suspected that someone in power was using him as an informant.
Need to Know: The mug shots taken of Carlos Hernandez in April 1983 are the only photos of him over the years where his mustache is shaved off, as if he were trying to alter his appearance. Family and friends of both Carloses who saw these mug shots side-by-side with DeLuna's misidentified Hernandez as DeLuna.
Part III: The Prosecution of Carlos DeLuna
10. Investigation
Detective Olivia Escobedo was assigned to investigate Wanda's death on her own, even though it was her first capital murder case. Escobedo was inexperienced and her ID technician Joel Infante was subpar, according to Sergeant Garza. However, Garza kept his distance from the case; when CDP investigators brought him the file of crime scene evidence, it was the first time he had examined it or offered his opinion on how the job was done.
His reaction when he saw the file was one of astonishment and dismay. Photos of the scene, which are available online, showed blood everywhere, as well as scattered personal items like clumps of hair, a cigarette butt, and chewed gum. One photo showed Escobedo stepping on evidence; others showed what had to be the attacker's shoeprint in blood. DNA testing had not yet been invented, but blood and other fluids could have been tested to match suspects. However, no swabs were taken of any of the blood at the scene, and out of twenty-one surfaces that Garza identified as eligible for collecting fingerprints, only six had been tested.
Need to Know: Instead of inspecting the crime scene thoroughly and restricting access to the Sigmor, at least until she could examine the scene in daylight, Escobedo rushed through the investigation and collected little usable evidence. Infante hurt more than he helped by failing to obtain usable fingerprints. He also ruined the fluids on a key piece of evidence — the buck knife — by using an incorrect method to test it for prints.
11. Defense
Attorneys Hector De Peña and James Lawrence were assigned to represent DeLuna at his trial. DeLuna's court date was postponed twice over the course of five months, but his defenders hardly took advantage of the extra time they were afforded to investigate his case. De Peña was an inexperienced general practitioner who believed in DeLuna's innocence, but had no real idea about how to prove it; Lawrence was handling a heavy caseload and had hoped DeLuna would be willing to take a plea deal.
The prosecution steadily built their case against DeLuna in the meantime. The defense team exhibited a naïve trust toward the prosecutors, who are legally required to release evidence to the defense that might help their client's case. Evidence uncovered by CDP investigators and by Rene Rodriguez, the lawyer who later sued Diamond Shamrock Company on the Vargases' behalf, shows that the prosecutors were careful not to disclose evidence that would harm their own case. The more egregious examples of things they omitted include the tape recording of the manhunt, confirmation of Carlos Hernandez's existence, and the recording of Wanda's first 911 call — wherein she asked for help before her killer even came into the store.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Summary and Analysis of The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Execution by Worth Books. Copyright © 2017 Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.. Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Context,Overview,
Summary,
Timeline,
Cast of Characters,
Direct Quotes and Analysis,
Trivia,
What's That Word?,
Critical Response,
About James S. Liebman,
About the Columbia DeLuna Project,
For Your Information,
Bibliography,
Copyright,