Mexico City – The Mexican government is making a last-ditch effort to stop the execution in Texas of Mexican Angel Maturino Resendiz, the infamous “Railroad Killer,” who is set to die Tuesday evening.
“We will continue fighting (for the condemned man) because we believe that the death penalty does not solve absolutely anything,” Mexican presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar said.
Aguilar told a press conference that Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez contacted Texas Gov. Rick Perry to ask for clemency for Maturino Resendiz.
Maturino Resendiz, who was born in Mexico’s Puebla state, was arrested by U.S. authorities in July 1999 on murder charges.
The 46-year-old Maturino Resendiz was sentenced to die by lethal injection for the 1985 killing of Dr. Claudia Benton, 39, in Houston.
He was sentenced to death on May 22, 2000, by a Texas court.
Maturino Resendiz, who was dubbed the “Railroad Killer” because he committed most of his crimes near railway tracks, was linked to 15 killings across several U.S. states.
Mexico hopes that Perry will commute Maturino Resendiz’s death sentence to life in prison.
Last week, a state court in Houston declared that Maturino Resendiz was mentally competent to be executed, despite testimony from psychiatrists that he was schizophrenic and suffered from delusions.
The European Union and 14 nations have also asked Texas to grant clemency to Maturino Resendiz.
In June 2005, the Mexican Congress officially abolished the death penalty, more than 40 years after the country’s last execution.
On March 31, 2004, the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled in favor of the Mexican government and urged the United States to review the trials of more than 50 Mexican nationals sentenced to death in U.S. courts.
The tribunal based its decision on the fact that the prisoners were not accorded the right to consular protection set forth in the Vienna Convention.
So far, at least six of the 51 cases have been reviewed, but U.S. states have judicial autonomy and some governors have ignored the international court’s ruling.
The Associated Press reported that Angel Maturino Resendiz has been executed.
