Thread: Waco judge rules death row inmate not retarded

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Court orders action on convicted murderer's mental fitness claim


Saturday, July 08, 2006

By Tommy Witherspoon

Tribune-Herald staff writer

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has ordered a Waco state district court to determine within 90 days if there is evidence to support death row inmate Ramiro Rubi Ibarra’s claim that he is mentally retarded.

Ibarra, a 52-year-old Mexican citizen, was convicted in Waco in 1997 in the 1987 sexual assault and strangulation death of Waco teenager Maria Zuniga.

Since his conviction, Ibarra has raised two issues on appeal that were not presented during his trial in Waco’s 54th State District Court but have since garnered close scrutiny by the nation’s highest courts — the execution of mentally retarded inmates and access to consulates by Mexicans on death row.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals rejected Ibarra’s original appeal in October 1998, and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to consider his appeal two years later.

Since that time, Austin attorney Russ Hunt Jr., who was appointed to handle Ibarra’s federal appeal, filed notices with state and federal appeals courts that there is evidence the former construction worker may be mentally retarded.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that mentally retarded inmates are not eligible for the death penalty.

In an order dated June 30, the Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin instructs 54th State District Judge George Allen to conduct a hearing to determine Ibarra’s mental status.

“By written order dated November 10, 2004, this court remanded the case to the convicting court to resolve the allegations raised,” the court’s order says. “It has now been more than one year and seven months, and the case has not been resolved and returned to this court.”

Allen has set a hearing in the case for July 18.

A psychologist has determined that Ibarra has an IQ of about 65, about five points lower than the accepted standard for mental retardation, Hunt said.

Ralph Strother, who served with Enid Wade as special prosecutor in Ibarra’s case after McLennan County District Attorney John Segrest recused his office, said Ibarra’s claims of retardation are just an appellate ploy.

“He was smart enough for about 10 years to get away with cold-blooded rape and murder, and he was smart enough for many years to get away with the aggravated sexual assault of a boy over in Bell County, so I’d say there is nothing wrong with his mind, other than being a criminal who needs to be brought to justice,” Strother said.

Ibarra was arrested on the day Zuniga’s body was found at her South 17th Street residence. Waco police got a search warrant for hair and blood samples from Ibarra but did not obtain the warrant from a judge with the authority to issue it.

Segrest, in private practice at the time, represented Ibarra and got the improper search warrant thrown out and won Ibarra’s release. Ibarra remained free until a 1995 law change that allowed police to obtain more than one evidentiary search warrant per case. By that time, Segrest was district attorney.

Taking advantage of the law change, police found enough evidence to tie Ibarra to the crime and to put him on death row.

Ibarra also is serving a life prison term for sexually assaulting his nephew in Bell County.

Allen said the matter has remained in his court while waiting on U.S. Supreme Court and other appellate court rulings on the related issues.

Strother, who is now 19th State District judge, is no longer involved with the case. Wade said Friday that she has been in contact with the attorney general’s office about the case and has been working to line up a status hearing in the case to determine which issues need to be resolved.

Two weeks ago, the U.S. Supreme Court severely limited the claims by Ibarra and about 49 other Mexican death row inmates that they deserve new trials because they were not allowed to contact the Mexican Consulate after their arrests.

Because of that ruling, Ibarra’s only remaining claim to be resolved by the trial court is his allegation of mental retardation, Wade said.

twitherspoon@wacotrib.com

757-5737

http://www.wacotrib.com

Waco judge rules death row inmate not retarded


Tuesday, September 19, 2006

By Tommy Witherspoon

Tribune-Herald staff writer

With no evidence offered other than an unsworn affidavit from a psychologist in Puerto Rico, a state district judge in Waco determined Monday that death row inmate Ramiro Rubi Ibarra is not mentally retarded and thus eligible for the death penalty.

For the second time in two months, Ibarra’s attorney, Gregory J. Kuykendall, asked 54th State District Judge George Allen to postpone the hearing, claiming he lacked the funds and time to adequately prepare for the hearing.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals sent the case back to Allen in November 2004 to determine Ibarra’s mental state. Allen waited to have Ibarra’s hearing because the U.S. Supreme Court was considering an unrelated case involving a death row inmate’s claims that executing mentally retarded inmates violates Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment.

However, the Court of Criminal Appeals recently ordered Allen to determine the issue by Sept. 28.

The U.S. Supreme Court has since ruled that mentally retarded inmates are not eligible for the death penalty.

Ibarra, 52, a Mexican citizen, was convicted in Allen’s court in 1997 in the sexual assault and strangulation death of Waco teenager Maria Zuniga in 1987.

While Ibarra did not allege mental retardation during his trial, his attorneys have since filed briefs alleging he has an IQ of about 65.

Kuykendall, a Tucson, Ariz., attorney who serves as director of the Mexican Capital Legal Assistance Program, is being paid by the Mexican government to appeal Ibarra’s case and those of the other 50 Mexicans on death row across the country.

In seeking another postponement of the hearing, Kuykendall told the judge that he needed more time to locate, interview and arrange travel to Waco for witnesses who knew Ibarra as a child in rural Zacatecas, Mexico.

After Allen rejected his motion for a second time since July, Kuykendall offered only a report by Puerto Rican psychologist Carol M. Romey that was not notarized. Romey is not licensed to practice in the United States. She wrote in her report that she was unwilling to travel to Waco without assurances that she would be compensated.

“I didn’t have any evidence,” Kuykendall said after the hearing. “But the reason I didn’t have any evidence was because of the judge.”

Allen had granted an initial request from Kuykendall for up to $7,500 to pay an investigator. Allen told him during the hearing that he requested an additional $9,000 almost immediately without providing any documentation about how or if he spent the initial allotment.

“What you apparently want is an open bill to call anyone in the United States and beyond to come down here,” said Allen, growing increasingly more impatient with Kuykendall. “I authorized $7,500. You haven’t furnished one iota of evidence that you have spent one dime on anything.”

Ibarra has the burden to prove he is mentally retarded. With no witnesses and Romey’s report standing alone to support Ibarra’s claims, special prosecutor Enid Wade argued that there was plenty of evidence to show that he is not mentally retarded and asked Allen to reject his claim.

“It is unbelievable to me that the state is being required to expend this much time and money for this newly raised claim,” Wade said after the hearing. “It is certainly no coincidence that Mr. Ibarra just decided he was mentally retarded after the Supreme Court said that if you are mentally retarded you can’t be executed. He killed this girl in 1987 and he didn’t realize that he was mentally retarded until 2003.”

Kuykendall said he will continue to appeal Ibarra’s case.

“I understand the pain and the outrage, but people need to understand that mental retardation is a very real phenomenon and it affects a high percentage of the people who are on death row,” he said.

Wade was appointed special prosecutor because John Segrest represented Ibarra before being elected McLennan County district attorney. She said Ibarra is “taking advantage of the system.”

“What we have had is delay, delay, delay and more delay,” she said. “They knew full well what this hearing was about, and they show up and say Mr. Ibarra has lived in the United States for 34 years. He has been on the earth for 52 years. We have known about this hearing for a couple of years. Yet we could not find one person on the planet to come here and say he is mentally retarded.

Wade said she was prepared to provide evidence from Ibarra’s employers, jailers and others and offer the trial testimony of his wife and brother, who testified that he held good jobs and provided for his family.

After his trial in Waco, Ibarra was convicted of molesting his nephew in Bell County and was sentenced to life in prison.

twitherspoon@wacotrib.com

757-5737