A two-part inves­tiga­tive series by the Houston Chronicle casts seri­ous doubt on the guilt of a Texas man who was exe­cut­ed in 1993. Ruben Cantu had per­sis­tent­ly pro­claimed his inno­cence and was only 17 when he was charged with cap­i­tal mur­der for the shoot­ing death of a San Antonio man dur­ing an attempt­ed rob­bery. Now, the pros­e­cu­tor and the jury fore­woman have expressed doubts about the case. Moreover, both a key eye­wit­ness in the state’s case against Cantu and Cantu’s co-defen­dant have come for­ward to say that Texas exe­cut­ed an inno­cent man.

Juan Moreno, who was wound­ed dur­ing the attempt­ed rob­bery and was a key eye­wit­ness in the case against Cantu, now says that it was not Cantu who shot him and that he only iden­ti­fied Cantu as the shoot­er because he felt pres­sured and was afraid of the author­i­ties. Moreno said that he twice told police that Cantu was not his assailant, but that the author­i­ties con­tin­ued to pres­sure him to iden­ti­fy Cantu as the shoot­er after Cantu was involved in an unre­lat­ed wound­ing of a police offi­cer. ​“The police were sure it was (Cantu) because he had hurt a police offi­cer. They told me they were cer­tain it was him, and that’s why I tes­ti­fied.… That was bad to blame some­one that was not there,” Moreno told the Chronicle. 

In addi­tion, David Garza, Cantu’s co-defen­dant dur­ing his 1985 tri­al, recent­ly signed a sworn affi­davit say­ing that he allowed Cantu to be accused and exe­cut­ed even though he was­n’t with him on the night of the killing. Garza stat­ed, ​“Part of me died when he died. You’ve got a 17-year-old who went to his grave for some­thing he did not do. Texas mur­dered an inno­cent per­son.”

Sam D. Millsap, Jr., the Bexar County District Attorney who charged Cantu with cap­i­tal mur­der, said he nev­er should have sought the death penal­ty in a case based on tes­ti­mo­ny from an eye­wit­ness who iden­ti­fied a sus­pect only after police showed him Cantu’s pho­to three seper­ate times.

Miriam Ward, fore­woman of the jury that con­vict­ed Cantu, said the jury’s deci­sion was the best they could do based on the infor­ma­tion pre­sent­ed dur­ing the tri­al. She not­ed, ​“With a lit­tle extra work, a lit­tle extra effort, maybe we’d have got­ten the right infor­ma­tion. The bot­tom line is, an inno­cent per­son was put to death for it. We all have our fin­ger in that.”

(Houston Chronicle, November 20 & 21, 2005 and Associated Press, November 21, 2005). See Innocence. See also DPIC’s recent report on juries and the death penal­ty, Blind Justice.

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