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Thread: Adrian Estrada - Texas

  1. #1
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    Adrian Estrada - Texas




    Facts of the Crime:

    On December 12, 2005, in Bexar County, Estrada stabbed Stephanie Sanchez , 17, 11 times with a large butcher knife and then strangled her, resulting in the deaths of her and her unborn child.

    Estrada was sentenced to death in February 2007.

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    The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals remanded Estrada for a new punishment hearing for Estrada in today's orders/opinions.

    Opinion is here:

    http://www.cca.courts.state.tx.us/OP...PINIONID=19805

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    HOUSTON — The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has thrown out the death sentence of a San Antonio man condemned for murdering his 17-year-old girlfriend and their unborn child in 2005.

    The state's highest criminal court Wednesday upheld the conviction of former youth minister Adrian Estrada. His case now returns to court in Bexar (bayr) County for a new punishment trial.

    The appeals court said jurors who decided that Estrada should die for killing Stephanie Sanchez and her unborn child had incorrect information from a prosecution witness regarding prison restrictions on capital murder convicts who get life without parole, rather than a death sentence.

    Jurors had those sentencing choices after convicting Estrada of capital murder in February 2007.

    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7056156.html

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    HOUSTON — The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Wednesday threw out the death sentence of a former San Antonio youth pastor condemned three years ago of murdering his teenage girlfriend and their unborn child.

    The state's highest criminal court said jurors who decided Adrian Estrada should die for killing 17-year-old Stephanie Sanchez and her unborn child had incorrect information from a prosecution witness regarding prison restrictions on capital murder convicts who are given life without parole rather than a death sentence.

    A jury in Bexar County had those sentencing choices after convicting Estrada of capital murder.

    The court upheld his conviction but Estrada, 26, now returns to a Bexar County court for a new punishment trial.

    At the time of his conviction, prosecutors said they believed Estrada's case was the first in Texas where someone was sentenced to die for killing an unborn child. He specifically was charged with capital murder for a multiple killing — the young woman and her unborn baby. A medical examiner testified at Estrada's trial there was nothing wrong with the child to cause death except that the mother was dead.

    In 2003, Texas legislators amended the definition of the word "individual" under the law to include an "unborn child at every stage of gestation from fertilization until birth."

    Sanchez was three months pregnant on Dec. 12, 2005, when she was found dead in her family's home. She had been stabbed 13 times with a butcher knife and choked. During the trial, DNA evidence was presented to show Estrada was the father of the child.

    Evidence showed he had impregnated Sanchez three times, that she got an abortion once, had a miscarriage, then decided with the third pregnancy to have the child. Court documents show Estrada did not tell her he also was having sex with another underage girl in his youth group at the El Sendero Assembly of God church.

    Estrada's lawyers raised 44 challenges to his 2007 conviction and sentence. The appeals court denied all but one on punishment regarding inmate classification in prison.

    Prosecutors acknowledged in legal briefs to the appeals court that "in the interest of justice" Estrada was entitled to a new punishment hearing.

    The Bexar County District Attorney's Office did not immediately respond Wednesday to a message from The Associated Press seeking comment on the ruling.

    Estrada contended testimony from A.P. Merillat, who investigates prison crimes for the state and has testified for prosecutors at death penalty trials, was incorrect when he said a convict sentenced to life without parole after 10 years could become eligible for the lowest classification level within the prison system, meaning he'd be eligible for less restriction on things like housing, jobs, commissary and recreation time.

    The issue was raised by jurors in a note sent to the judge during deliberations.

    The appeals court said that while both prosecutors and Estrada's lawyers seemed to agree the incorrect testimony was not intentional, Estrada's attorneys believed the testimony violated their client's constitutional rights and could have influenced the jury's punishment decision.

    "There is a fair probability that (Estrada's) death sentence was based upon Merillat's incorrect testimony as evidence by the jury's notes," the appeals court said. "We believe that the Supreme Court would find this to be constitutionally intolerable."

    Court records show the underage girl who also was having sex with Estrada testified he told her about two weeks before the slaying that he wished he could kill Sanchez.

    Estrada told police he killed the young woman after she attacked him with a knife and that he stabbed her because she wasn't dying when he choked her. He also told detectives Sanchez was ruining his life, according to court documents.

    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7056365.html

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    Ex-minister formerly on death row re-sentenced

    A former youth minister formerly on death row for killing his 17-year-old girlfriend and their unborn child has been re-sentenced to life in prison.

    Adrian Estrada accepted the plea Thursday in a San Antonio courtroom. A jury convicted Estrada in 2007 and sentenced him to death, but a Texas appeals court threw out the sentence last year because jurors heard incorrect testimony during the punishment phase.

    A prosecution witness had wrongly testified that capital murder convicts serving life can eventually become eligible for fewer restrictions on things like housing and jobs. Jurors raised that issue in a note sent to the judge during deliberations.

    At the time of his conviction, prosecutors believed Estrada's case was the first in Texas where someone was sentenced to die for killing an unborn child.

    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7531634.html

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    Victim's mom outraged after S.A. man escapes death sentence

    A man convicted of murdering his pregnant teenage girlfriend escapes the death penalty in court Thursday.

    Thursday morning, a life sentence was handed down for Adrian Estrada, convicted in the stabbing death of his 17-year-old pregnant girlfriend, Stephanie Sanchez, back in 2005.

    He was handed the death penalty, but the sentence was overturned.

    The victim's mother, Mary Vargas, addressed Estrada, saying: "You just left my daughter there to die. I hate you so much. You should have never, never, never gotten another chance."

    Estrada was Sanchez's youth pastor at the time of her death.

    http://www.kens5.com/news/Convicted-...120376974.html

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