On
this date, June 27, 2006, a Mexican Serial Killer, Angel Maturino Reséndiz
A.K.A The Railroad Killer, was executed by lethal injection in Texas. I will
post information about this Serial Killer from Wikipedia and other links.
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Photo of Ángel Maturino Reséndiz, who was an
FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive.
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Born
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Ángel Leoncio Reyes
Recendis
August 1, 1959 Izucar de Matamoros, Puebla |
Died
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June 27, 2006 (aged 45)
Huntsville, Texas |
Criminal charge
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Serial murder, sexual assault
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Angel Maturino Reséndiz, aka The Railroad Killer/The Railway Killer/The
Railcar Killer (August 1, 1959 – June 27, 2006), was an itinerant Mexican
serial killer responsible for as many as 15 murders across the United States
and Mexico during the 1990s. Some also involved sexual assault. He became known
as "The Railroad (or Railway) Killer" as most of his crimes were
committed near railroads where he had jumped off the trains he was using to
travel about the country. On June 21, 1999, he briefly became the
457th fugitive listed by the FBI on its Ten Most
Wanted Fugitives list before surrendering to the Texas authorities
on July 13. He was 39 years old.
Reséndiz had many aliases but was chiefly known and sought after as Rafael Resendez-Ramirez. One of his aliases, Ángel Reyes Reséndiz, was very close to the name Ángel Leoncio Reyes Recendis given on his birth certificate from Izúcar de Matamoros, Puebla, Mexico. Reséndez was in the United States illegally.
Murders
and methodology
By
illegally jumping on and off trains both within and across Mexico, Canada and
the United States, generally crossing borders illegally, Reséndiz was able to
evade authorities for a considerable time. He also had no fixed addresses.
Reséndiz
killed as many as 15 people with rocks, a pick axe and other blunt objects,
mainly in their homes. After each murder he would linger in the homes for a
while, mainly to eat; he took sentimental things and laid out the victims'
driver's licenses to learn a bit about the lives he had taken. He stole jewelry
and other items and gave them to his wife in Mexico. Much of the jewelry was
sold or melted down. Some of the items that were removed from the homes were
returned by his wife after his surrender/capture. Money, however, was sometimes
left at the scene. He raped some of his female victims; rape served as a
secondary intent. Most of his victims were found covered with a blanket, or
otherwise obscured from immediate view.
Victims
1.
In 1986, an unidentified homeless woman was shot four times with a
.38-caliber weapon. Her body was dumped in an abandoned farmhouse. Reséndiz
stated that he met the woman at a homeless shelter. They took a motorcycle trip
together, bringing a gun along to fire for target practice. Reséndiz said that
he shot and killed the woman for disrespecting him.
2.
Resendiz stated that soon after killing the homeless woman, he shot and killed
her boyfriend - a Cuban - and dumped his body in a creek somewhere
between San Antonio and Uvalde. Reséndiz said that he killed the man because he
was involved in black magic. This man's body has never been found, and nothing
is known about him except what Reséndiz told authorities. Reséndiz confessed to
these first two murders in September 2001, in hopes that doing so would speed
up his execution.
3.
On July 19, 1991, the body of Michael White, 33, was found in the front
yard of an abandoned downtown house. Reséndiz also confessed to this murder in
September 2001. He drew a map of the crime scene and said that he killed White
because he was homosexual. Police concluded in April 2006 that Reséndiz did in
fact kill White. He was bludgeoned to death with a brick.
4
and 5. March 23, 1997, Ocala, Florida, Jesse Howell, 19 years old.
He was bludgeoned to death with an air hose coupling and left beside the
tracks. His fiancee Wendy Von Huben, 16 years old, was raped, strangled,
suffocated with his hands and duct tape and buried in a shallow grave in Sumter County, Florida.
6.
In July 1997, an unidentified transient was beaten to death with a piece
of plywood in a rail yard located in the City of Colton, California. Colton
Police detective Jack Morenberg worked non-stop to prove Reséndiz committed the
crime but was unable to do so. Reséndiz is still considered the prime suspect
in this case.
7.
August 29, 1997, Lexington, Kentucky, Christopher Maier, 21 years old.
He was a University of Kentucky student walking along nearby railroad tracks
with his girlfriend, Holly, when the two were attacked by Reséndiz, who
bludgeoned Maier to death with a 52 pound rock. Reséndiz raped and severely
beat Maier's girlfriend, who nearly died as a result. Holly Dunn Pendleton, the
only known survivor, went on to appear on the Biography channel television
program "I Survived", and "48 Hours: Left for Dead"; the ID
channel series "Dates From Hell" (episode 8, "A Killer Night");
and her story was told in the UK newspaper, The Guardian. Currently she helps
other victims of rape, sexual assault, and crime. She also founded "Holly's
House" in her native Evansville, Indiana to benefit those victims of rape,
sexual assault, and crime as well as working closely with RAINN.
8.
October 4, 1998, Hughes Springs, Texas, Leafie Mason,
81 years old. She was hammered to death with an antique flat iron by Reséndiz,
who entered through a window. Fifty yards outside her door was the Kansas
City-Southern Rail line.
9.
December 17, 1998, West University Place, Texas, Claudia
Benton, 39 years old. Benton, a pediatric neurologist
at the Baylor College of Medicine, was raped,
stabbed, and bludgeoned repeatedly after he entered her home, which is near the
Union
Pacific railroad tracks. Police found her Jeep Cherokee in San Antonio and found Reséndiz's fingerprints on
the steering column. After the murder, Reséndiz had a warrant for his arrest
for burglary, but not yet for murder.
10
and 11. May 2, 1999, Weimar, Texas, Norman J. Sirnic, 46 years old,
and Karen Sirnic, 47 years old. The Sirnics were bludgeoned to death by
a sledgehammer in a parsonage of the United Church of Christ, where Norman
Sirnic was a pastor. The building was located adjacent to the Union
Pacific railroad. The Sirnics' red Mazda was also found
in San Antonio three weeks later, and fingerprints
link their case with the Claudia Benton case.
12.
June 4, 1999, Houston, Texas, Noemi Dominguez, 26 years
old. Dominguez, a schoolteacher at Houston Independent School District's
Benjamin Franklin Elementary School, was bludgeoned to death with a pickaxe in
her apartment near the rail tracks. Seven days later, her white Honda Civic was
discovered by state troopers on the International Bridge in Del
Rio, Texas.
13.
June 4, 1999, Fayette County, Texas, Josephine
Konvicka, 73 years old. Konvicka was killed by a blow of the same pickaxe
used to kill Noemi Dominguez on the head while she lay sleeping. Her farmhouse
is not far from Weimar. Reséndiz attempted to steal the car but was unable to
take it away since he could not find the car keys.
14
and 15. June 15, 1999, Gorham, Illinois, George Morber, Sr., 80
years old, and Carolyn Frederick, 52 years old. Reséndiz shot George
Morber in the head with a shotgun and then clubbed Carolyn Frederick to death
with a tire iron. Their house was located only 100 yards (90 m) away from a
railroad track. Later, someone spotted a man matching Reséndiz's description
driving Carolyn Frederick's red pickup truck in Cairo,
Illinois, which is located 40 miles south of Gorham.
16.
Reséndiz is suspected in the death of Fannie Whitney Byers, 81, who was
found Dec. 10, 1998, bludgeoned to death in her Carl,
Georgia home located near CSX Transportation railroad tracks with a tire
rim. A Lexington couple was charged in this Barrow County murder, but Reséndiz admitted
to an FBI agent that he killed Byers, according to authorities.
He
confessed to seven other killings as well, which he said took place in Mexico.
Arrest
and trial
The
police tracked down Reséndiz's sister, Manuela. She feared that her brother
might kill someone else or be killed by the FBI, so she agreed to help the
police. A Texas Ranger, Drew Carter, accompanied by Manuela and a spiritual
guide met up with Reséndiz on a bridge connecting El Paso, Texas, with Ciudad
Juárez, Chihuahua. (Manuela was originally reluctant to cooperate, but Carter
convinced her otherwise.) Reséndiz surrendered to Carter.
During
a court appearance, Reséndiz accused Carter of lying under oath because his
(Reséndiz's) family was under the impression that he would be spared the death
penalty; however, Reséndiz's ultimate fate would be decided by the jury, not
Carter.
In
1999, former Texas Attorney General Jim Mattox –
wary of the controversy miring the many confessions and recantations by Henry
Lee Lucas – remarked of Reséndiz that "I hope they don't start
pinning on him every crime that happens near a railroad track."
Reséndiz
would be tried and sentenced to death for Benton's murder.
He
received the Texas Department of Criminal
Justice ID#999356.
Mental
health
On
June 21, 2006, a Houston judge ruled that Reséndiz was mentally competent to be
executed. Upon hearing the judge's ruling, Reséndiz said, "I don't believe in death. I know the body is going to
go to waste. But me, as a person, I'm eternal. I'm going to be alive
forever." He also described himself as half-man and half-angel and
told psychiatrists he couldn't be executed because he didn't believe he could
die.
Statements
like the above have led specialists to conclude that Reséndiz was not competent
to be executed. In the words of a bilingual psychiatrist who evaluated Reséndiz
on two occasions in 2006, “delusions had completely taken over [Reséndiz’s]
thought processes.”
Death
Despite
an appeal pending with the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Reséndiz had the
death warrant signed for the murder of Claudia Benton. He was housed in the Polunsky
Unit in West Livingston, Texas.
He
was executed in the Huntsville Unit in Huntsville, Texas, on June 27, 2006, by lethal
injection. In his final statement, Reséndiz said:
"I want to ask if it is in your heart to forgive me. You don't
have to. I know I allowed the Devil to rule my life. I just ask you to forgive
me and ask the Lord to forgive me for allowing the devil to deceive me. I thank
God for having patience in me. I don't deserve to cause you pain. You do not
deserve this. I deserve what I am getting."
Reséndiz
was pronounced dead at 8:05 p.m. CDT (01:05 UTC on June 28, 2006).
Claudia
Benton's husband George was present at the execution and said Reséndiz was "evil contained in human form, a creature without a
soul, no conscience, no sense of remorse, no regard for the sanctity of human life."
Media
The
Reséndiz case was featured in four criminal documentaries:
- Crime Stories on the Discovery Channel
- Infamous Murders, "Death in the Country", on The History Channel
- Murder She Solved: True Crime, "Episode 13: Railway Killer", on Oprah Winfrey Network (Canadian TV channel)
- The FBI Files, "Tracks of a Killer", on the Biography Channel (2003)
Reséndiz
also featured on the December 11, 2010, episode of 48 Hours Mystery
(CBS), "Live to Tell: The Railroad Killer", when Holly Dunn shared
the story of her attack. The specific murder of Christopher Maier and the woman
(Holly Dunn), who accompanied Christopher on the night of his murder and the
torture she prolonged was shown on the television show "Dates from
Hell"
In
the episode of Criminal Minds, "Catching Out", features a
serial killer named Armando Salinas who appears to have been based on Reséndiz
(Like Reséndiz, he was a Hispanic drifter who travelled along railroads and
killed the majority of his victims by bludgeoning them).
OTHER LINKS:
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