Eyewitness to an execution; the Texas 7 case
Thursday, August 14, 2008
By JASON WHITELY / WFAA-TV
HUNTSVILLE - Outside the death chamber was an unusual scene for an
all too familiar event.
At least 100 policemen and sheriff’s deputies from across the state
stood in support of a fallen officer’s widow and seeing justice through.
“We’re certainly trying to send a message to those people that choose
to harm police officers that we will not be assaulted this way and
that we will provide justice,” said Lowell Cannaday, former Irving
Police Chief.
The Background:
They came to witness Michael Rodriguez’s execution for the murder of
Irving policeman Aubrey Hawkins on Christmas Eve 2000.
He is the first of the notorious "Texas 7," a gang of prison
escapees, captured in a nationwide manhunt after they murdered
Hawkins during a robbery at a sporting goods store.
Hawkins was shot 11 times and then run over with his own patrol car.
Rodriguez, 45, waived his appeals and volunteered to die.
The Execution:
He ordered a heavy final meal. The meal was five courses and
consisted of a fried chicken breast (preferably spicy), a grilled
pork steak with grilled onions, a loaded bacon cheeseburger, a fresh
garden salad with French dressing and french fries with ketchup.
The meal came at 4:00 p.m., which was after Rodriguez made a few
final phone calls. It’s uncertain with whom he spoke.
Then at 6:02 p.m. Thursday, prison guards unlocked his cell and
escorted him a few steps down the hall to the death chamber, which
was a small brick room painted green and is about the size of a
suburban master bathroom.
A clock hung on one wall and a gurney stood in the middle, bearing a
clean white sheet and brown leather straps. There were places for an
individual’s arms to shoot out from both sides of the table.
At 6:03 p.m., Rodriguez was strapped to the gurney.
I was among five media witnesses. We walked up the stairs to the
infamous Walls Unit and into a side office, where a prison guard
asked everyone to empty their pockets. After he patted everyone down,
he then passed a metal detecting wand around everyone's bodies.
“Cell phones, guns and knives have to be left here,” he said.
After a few minutes, we walked down another long hallway, through a
heavy steel door and out into a lush garden with flowers, monkey
grass and other plants that lined the sidewalk.
Through three barbed wire gates, we entered another steel door off
the courtyard and walked into what amounted to a large walk-in closet.
On the other end was a glass wall, a set of prison bars and
Rodriguez, who was on his back and strapped to the gurney. He was
quietly singing a hymn that was easily heard in the room since there
was a microphone that hung from the ceiling over his body.
Others, including Lori Hawkins (the officer’s widow), Rodriguez’s
former sister-in-law, two Irving policemen, Lt. Dennis Norton, Lt.
Jeff Spivey and three other witnesses Hawkins asked to attend, were
already in the viewing room when we entered.
Rodriguez refused to allow his family to watch.
A reporter for the Associated Press joined me. A prison
representative behind the victim’s family peered in on the
condemned’s final moments.
“Do you have a final statement?” the warden asked.
“Yes, I do,” Rodriguez replied.
Tilting his head to the side, looking into the viewing room, he
began. It was 6:10 p.m.
“I know this in no way makes up for all the pain and suffering I gave
you,” he said. “I am so sorry. My punishment is nothing compared to
the pain and sorrow I have caused.”
Strapped to the gurney, it sounded sincere.
“I’m not strong enough to ask for forgiveness because I don’t know if
I’m worthy,” he continued.
The two Irving police officers stood stoic and straight-faced.
The only emotion came from Hawkins’ widow. She was visibly shaken and
at several points wiped away tears.
“Please, Lord forgive me,” Rodriguez said looking through the window
at the witnesses. “I have done some horrible things. I ask the Lord
to please forgive me. I gained nothing, but just brought sorrow and
pain to these wonderful people.”
He finished minutes later and said, “I am ready to go Lord. Thank you.”
Rodriguez started singing quietly.
The solution had started flowing.
The lethal dose began at 6:13 p.m.
Rodriguez closed his eyes.
He made sounds similar to snoring, but that is said to be an effect
of the drugs.
At 6:18 p.m., a man in a black suit with pinstripes entered the death
chamber. Rodriguez was not moving. His head tilted slightly toward us.
The man, with a stethoscope around his neck, felt Rodriguez’s neck
several times trying to detect a pulse.
He put the stethoscope in his ears, pulled the sheet down and started
listening to his chest for a pulse.
After a minute or so, he looked up at the wall and announced, “6:20.”
A second man repeated, “6:20.”
It was Rodriguez’s official time of death.
The large steel door behind us opened and we paused to let Hawkins
and the other witnesses exit first.
In less than 20 minutes, using $86.08 of lethal drugs, Rodriguez was
declared dead, the eighth inmate Texas has executed this year. The
second one this week.
Hawkins walked out of the Walls Unit and down the stairs to a sea of
support. Law enforcement, most in uniform, from more than a dozen
agencies as far away as the Panhandle and the Rio Grande Valley were
all wearing ribbons in honor of her husband.
E-mail
jwhitely@wfaa.comhttp://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/localnews/news8/stories/
