Texas Prisoner Faces Execution Despite Doubts About His Guilt and Refusal of Courts to Assess New Evidence

Ivan Cantu is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on February 28, 2024, although Texas courts have refused to con­sid­er new evi­dence in his case that may prove he was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed. Mr. Cantu was sen­tenced to death in Collin County for the mur­der of his cousin and his cousin’s fiancée in November 2000. Texas sched­uled an exe­cu­tion date for Mr. Cantu in April 2023, but a last-minute appeal describ­ing new evi­dence of false wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny pro­vid­ed grounds for a stay of exe­cu­tion. However, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (TCCA) over­turned the stay and dis­missed Mr. Cantu’s request for an evi­den­tiary hear­ing four months lat­er with­out explain­ing its rea­sons. In more recent court fil­ings, Mr. Cantu’s attor­neys argue that numer­ous issues in his case war­rant a new tri­al, includ­ing the recan­ta­tion of a key witness.

Sister Helen Prejean and the actor Martin Sheen are among those call­ing for Mr. Cantu’s exe­cu­tion to be halt­ed. At a press con­fer­ence ear­li­er this week, Sister Helen Prejean said, ​“There was not fair­ness at this tri­al. All we’re ask­ing is [to] delay the exe­cu­tion of Ivan Cantu long enough to be able to have a hear­ing and an inquiry into the new evi­dence that’s been presented.”

At tri­al, the pros­e­cu­tion relied heav­i­ly on the tes­ti­mo­ny of Amy Boettcher, Mr. Cantu’s then-fiancée, who tes­ti­fied that he com­mit­ted the mur­ders, took her to the scene of the crime, and then took her on a trip to Arkansas. Law enforce­ment said they found one of the victim’s cars out­side of Mr. Cantu’s apart­ment the fol­low­ing day, as well as bloody pants match­ing the vic­tims’ DNA in Mr. Cantu’s trash can. Ms. Boettcher also tes­ti­fied that she dis­posed of Mr. Cantu’s bloody cloth­ing after the mur­der and said that he had thrown the Rolex watch of one of the vic­tims out of his mov­ing car as they drove out of town. Ms. Boettcher’s broth­er, Jeff Boettcher, also tes­ti­fied against Mr. Cantu. He told the jury that Mr. Cantu told him about the mur­ders before they hap­pened and lat­er recruit­ed him to help clean up the crime scene. Mr. Cantu has main­tained his inno­cence since his arrest, argu­ing that his cousin was killed by a local drug deal­er and rival and that police planted evidence.

New evi­dence uncov­ered by a pri­vate inves­ti­ga­tor and oth­ers now casts doubt on the valid­i­ty of Mr. Cantu’s con­vic­tion. In 2019, Mr. Cantu’s legal team dis­cov­ered that police recov­ered the victim’s Rolex watch after find­ing it in his home and return­ing it to his fam­i­ly, short­ly after the mur­der. In 2020, the police offi­cer who per­formed a well­ness check on Mr. Cantu, request­ed by his moth­er after she heard his cousin was killed, signed an affi­davit stat­ing she did not see bloody clothes in Mr. Cantu’s trash can. Neither Mr. Cantu nor Ms. Boettcher were home dur­ing the well­ness check, as they were in Arkansas. After Ms. Boettcher died in 2021, her broth­er Jeff called Collin County inves­ti­ga­tors and recant­ed his tri­al tes­ti­mo­ny. Speaking with an inves­ti­ga­tor and attor­ney in 2022, Mr. Boettcher told them that he lied and admit­ted that he was not reli­able at the time of tri­al, since he was out of state dur­ing the mur­der and was a fre­quent drug user. He reit­er­at­ed his remorse for help­ing place Mr. Cantu on death row.

Mr. Cantu’s attor­ney, Gena Bunn, who has been his coun­sel for 15 years, has repeat­ed­ly attempt­ed to per­suade a court to hear the new evi­dence. Ms. Bunn filed anoth­er request in January 2024, ask­ing the Court to reex­am­ine bal­lis­tic evi­dence used to secure Mr. Cantu’s con­vic­tion. Independent inves­ti­ga­tors and experts have now con­clud­ed from their own bal­lis­tic exper­i­ments that there is rea­son to doubt the foren­sic report intro­duced at tri­al. Ms. Bunn also argued that Mr. Cantu did not have ade­quate tri­al defense coun­sel. ​“They did not even have a defense inves­ti­ga­tor,” Ms. Bunn told the Texas Tribune ​“Even con­sid­er­ing how cap­i­tal rep­re­sen­ta­tion was 20 years ago, still that blows my mind.” 

Sister Prejean is lead­ing a ral­ly on February 22^nd at the Collin County cour­t­house to demand a hear­ing. She said that if the exe­cu­tion isn’t halt­ed she’ll be at Cantu’s side as he dies. ​“He’s asked me to be with him if they exe­cute him, and to pray with him,” Sister Prejean said. ​“But there’s no way I’m just going to be with this man and pray with him and ease him into eter­ni­ty with­out doing every­thing I know to do to resist this death. Because there’s so many wrongs that have been done.”