Court stays execution of Texas man days before he was set to die by
lethal injection
[March 12, 2025]
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Texas appeals court on Tuesday
halted the execution of a man who has spent more than 30 years on death
row and had been set to die by lethal injection this week over the
killings of six girls and young women found buried in the desert near El
Paso.
It was the second scheduled execution in the U.S. halted on Tuesday
after a federal judge stopped Louisiana’s first death row execution
using nitrogen gas, which was to take place next week.
In Texas, the order was another reprieve for David Leonard Wood, who in
2009 was about 24 hours away from execution when it was halted over
claims he is intellectually disabled and thus ineligible for execution.
Those claims were later rejected by a judge and Wood, 67, had been set
to die Thursday. But the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's
highest criminal court, issued a stay of execution after his latest
appeal, which renewed his claims of innocence.
The court put Wood's execution on pause “until further order." It did
not elaborate on the decision in a brief three-page order.
Had Wood been executed this week, he would have spent 32 years and two
months on Texas’ death row, the longest time a Texas inmate has waited
before being put to death.
The 1987 murders remained unsolved for several years until authorities
say Wood bragged to a cellmate that he was the so-called “Desert
Killer.” The victims’ bodies were found buried in shallow graves in the
same desert area northeast of El Paso.
Authorities said Wood gave rides to the victims and then drove them into
the desert, where he sexually assaulted and killed them. The victims
were Rosa Casio and Ivy Williams, both 23; Karen Baker, 21; Angelica
Frausto, 17; Desiree Wheatley, 15; and Dawn Smith, 14.
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Convicted killer David Leonard Wood poses for a photo at death row
in Huntsville, Texas, July 15, 2009. (AP Photo/Mike Graczyk, File)
Two other girls and a young woman were also reported missing but
were never found.
Wood, a repeat convicted sex offender who had worked as a mechanic,
has long maintained his innocence.
“I did not do it. I am innocent of this case. I’ll fight it,” Wood
said in recent documents filed in his appeals.
On March 4, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles declined a
request to commute his death sentence to a lesser penalty or grant
him a 90-day reprieve.
His lawyers have for years sought to have hundreds of pieces of
evidence tested for DNA after testing in 2011 of bloodstains on the
clothing Smith wore found a male DNA profile that was not Wood. The
Texas Attorney General’s Office has fought against new DNA tests and
various courts have denied Wood’s request for it.
Prior to the court's decision Tuesday, Gregory Wiercioch, one of
Wood’s attorneys, said that when authorities identified Wood as a
suspect, they focused on him and not on the evidence they had.
“We’ve tried to make it clear to the courts that he’s innocent, and
we’ll see if anyone listens,” Wiercioch said.
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