Carlos de Luna

Case record: Carlos de Luna

Status and key personal details

Carlos de Luna was executed by lethal injection in Texas on December 7, 1989. He was 27 years old at the time of execution. He was listed as Carlos DeLuna #744.

Last statement

Carlos De Luna’s last statement was: “I want to say I hold no grudges. I hate no one. I love my family. Tell everyone on death row to keep the faith and don’t give up.”

The offence

In February 1983, Wanda Lopez was stabbed to death during the night shift at a gas station convenience store where she was clerk.

Investigation

Wanda Lopez made two 911 calls during the incident. Police responded only after the end of her second call, following a series of yes-or-no questions with a dispatcher. After Lopez screamed, police identified that she had been stabbed.

Carlos De Luna was found after a brief manhunt while hiding underneath a pick-up truck.

Police reports said De Luna had been violating parole by drinking in public. The reports said he was staggering and intoxicated. School reports said he was developmentally impaired.

De Luna immediately told police he was innocent and offered to name a man he had seen inside the gas station. Police ignored De Luna’s statements.

Police ignored De Luna’s lack of physical links, including that he had “didn't have a drop of blood on his body or clothing,” despite a description of a physical struggle that “drench[ed] the crime scene in blood.”

Police brought Kevan Baker, their single eyewitness to the crime, to the squad car where De Luna was shirtless and handcuffed in the back seat.

After police indicated to Baker that De Luna was the killer, Baker identified De Luna. Baker told the Tribune he was never sure De Luna was the man he had seen, and would have been less sure if police had not hinted they had the right man.

Baker’s earlier description of the killer included a moustache and clothing described as dressed like a derelict, and the killer ran northwest behind the gas station.

Witnesses placed De Luna east of the gas station. De Luna had no moustache and was dressed in a white button-down dress shirt and dress pants.

When De Luna was arrested and from the time of his arrest until the night he was executed, he insisted he hid under the truck because he was on parole and got scared when he heard sirens coming. He told the officer who arrested him that he was not guilty but knew who was.

At trial, De Luna named Carlos Hernandez as the man he saw inside the gas station, across the street from the bar where De Luna had been drinking.

The Tribune investigation said Carlos Hernandez was a well-known Corpus Christi criminal and armed felon. It said he habitually wore a moustache, dressed like a “hobo,” and carried a buck knife like the one found at the Lopez crime scene. It said police ignored De Luna’s statements.

Police ended their investigation moments after Baker identified De Luna. The crime scene was turned over to a store manager, who could not believe he was allowed to wash down the store so soon after a major crime.

Police photographs of the scene were described as showing:

1. “a shoe heel print framed in blood,” with the description that the victim was barefoot when she was killed and De Luna’s shoes had no blood on them;
2. “a partially smoked cigarette butt” near the location of the stabbing, with the description that the assailant brought a Winston cigarette pack to the counter before attacking the victim, and Winston as Hernandez’s brand;
3. “a dark red button,” with the description that Baker told police the killer was wearing a red flannel shirt and Hernandez’s “winter uniform” was a red flannel shirt; and
4. “the murder weapon,” described as “an 8-inch buck knife smeared with blood.”

Except for the knife, police seized none of these items. The photographs were described as showing the lead investigator trampling on bloody evidence that was never seized.

Only four fingerprints were lifted from the scene. None were from the knife and none matched De Luna.

A former Corpus Christi police detective, Eddie Garza, told the Tribune that the police investigation was incompetent.

Trial

At trial, the prosecution argued that De Luna stabbed Wanda Lopez during the commission of a robbery. The Tribune investigation described that no money had been taken from the scene.

Baker told police the victim’s struggle with the assailant looked like a lover’s quarrel.

Hernandez’s neighbors were described as saying he knew Lopez and was romantically interested in her. There was no indication De Luna knew Lopez.

The supposed robbery was described as the only factor elevating the murder to a death-eligible crime.

Prosecutors rested their case on:

1. the 911 audio tape of the killing, described as incensing the jury but giving no hint of who killed Lopez except that it was a Hispanic male;
2. Kevan Baker’s night-time identification of De Luna, described as prompted by police and shown only a single suspect rather than the line-up standard procedure required; and
3. that De Luna was a liar, including the argument that De Luna identified Carlos Hernandez as the killer but Hernandez was “a phantom.”

The Tribune described that Hernandez was known and notorious to police and prosecutors.

It described that about two months after Lopez was killed, police arrested Hernandez behind a 7-11 Store at night, with a knife in his pocket.

It described that around the same time, police informants told Detective Garza that Hernandez had told them he killed Wanda Lopez, and that the lead detective ignored this information.

It described that one of the prosecutors admitted he knew Hernandez personally. It said that three years earlier, he had interviewed Hernandez on suspicion of knifing a young Hispanic woman to death and that Hernandez had been carrying a buck knife when arrested.

The prosecutor’s claim that Hernandez was a phantom prompted the jury to convict DeLuna and sentence him to die.

De Luna’s attorneys were described as misled. De Luna’s family never wavered in their belief that their Carlos could not have killed Wanda Lopez. The lawyers they hired were described as never going to the courthouse to look up Carlos Hernandez’s lengthy record of violent convictions and never otherwise investigating Hernandez’s record.

Outcome

Carlos de Luna was executed in 1989.

Aftermath

The Tribune’s series about the case was published sixteen years after the execution.

It was described that it was not until a decade and a half after De Luna was executed that the Tribune found five people, including Hernandez’s own niece, who heard Hernandez confess to stabbing and killing Lopez. It said Hernandez repeatedly laughed about his “stupid tocayo” who went to jail for Hernandez’s crime, and that “Tocayo” is the Spanish word for “namesake.” It was described that all five kept this information to themselves, fearing Hernandez’s wrath, and that some assumed they would be questioned but never were.

In 1999, ten years after De Luna was executed, Hernandez died in prison of liver cirrhosis.

During that decade, it was described that Hernandez stabbed another young Hispanic woman nearly to death and accumulated five additional arrests, with the last being an assault with a knife that landed him in prison for the last time.

A co-prosecutor in the De Luna case admitted they should not have told the jury Hernandez was a phantom.

It was described that no one apologized to Carlos De Luna or his family for wrongly taking his life. It was also described that no one apologized to Lopez’s family for botching that investigation and that no one apologized to Hernandez’s subsequent victims, who would have been safe if police and prosecutors had properly investigated the Lopez murder.

It was further described that a prosecutor told a local TV news station that he was reasonably confident they had the right guy.

Timeline

• February 1983 — Wanda Lopez was stabbed to death during the night shift at a gas station convenience store where she was clerk.
• December 7, 1989 — Texas executed 27-year-old Carlos de Luna by lethal injection.
• 1999 — Carlos Hernandez died in prison of liver cirrhosis.