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Friday, Feb. 12, 1999

Small Town Satanism

Psychiatrist says defendant was anti-social, suicidal

By MADELINE BARO
Associated Press

   EDINBURG, Texas - Prosecutors portrayed Pablo Lucio Vasquez, convicted of killing and mutilating a 12-year-old boy, as the embodiment of evil and deserving of the death penalty.
   "Evil exists in our community," prosecutor Joseph Orendain said. "Evil exists in our society. The first thing you need to do is to identify that evil, to understand it. You have to confront that evil and then you have to deal with that evil."
   Orendain told jurors to keep the victim, David Cardenas, in mind when they decide whether the 21-year-old Vasquez deserves to die by injection or be in prison for life.
   "You will never hear (Cardenas') side of what happened that night," Orendain said. "Pain, suffering, Pablo Lucio Vasquez ... What about the pain of the family? What about the pain of David Cardenas?"
   Cardenas' mother left the courtroom in tears during Orendain's statements, as she did during his closing arguments Tuesday.
   In his remarks, defense attorney Daniel Reyes said Vasquez should not be punished for his mental problems, some of which Reyes said are genetic.
   "If the answer to your special issues lead to Pablo Vasquez being put to death, then our society is going to be a society where eye for an eye is the rule of law, where tooth for a tooth is the rule of law, a society where vigilante justice is the law," he said.
   Jurors began deliberating late Thursday afternoon. They stopped for the day around 10 p.m. and were sequestered overnight. Deliberations were to resume Friday.
   A psychiatrist testified earlier Thursday that Vasquez was anti-social and had contemplated suicide because he feared the death penalty.
   "I know they're going to kill me, so I'd rather take my life," Vasquez told Diego Rodriguez Escobar during a September evaluation, the doctor testified.
   Rodriguez, who determined that Vasquez was mentally ill but competent to stand trial, was the defense's first witness during the punishment phase of the Vasquez's capital murder trial.
   People diagnosed as anti-social tend to be predatory in nature and are bound to repeat past mistakes, Rodriguez said during cross-examination by Orendain. It is a trait common to serial killers and mass murderers, he said. But the doctor added that he could not determine whether Vasquez is a continuing threat to society.
   "We cannot predict violence in psychiatry," he said.
   An academician also called by defense attorneys testified Thursday afternoon that statistics show those convicted of capital murder like Vasquez have a low likelihood of committing future violent acts.
   "The fact of the matter is murderers are usually your best behaved inmates and, when and if released, they are also your best behaved on parole," said Jonathan Sorensen, a criminal justice professor at the University of Texas-Pan American.
   Earlier Thursday, Mancias denied a defense motion to declare a mistrial because of news reports by a television station.
   Vasquez was convicted of killing Cardenas, whose body was found scalped and dismembered in a vacant field in Donna. The seventh-grader was killed the night of April 17-18 while partying with Vasquez and Andy Chapa, 15.
   In his statement to authorities, Vasquez admitted hitting Cardenas with a metal pipe, cutting him with a knife and drinking the boy's blood. He said the devil and other voices told him to commit the murder.
   Prosecutors have pointed to robbery as the motive for the vicious attack because the boy's jewelry was taken. However, the way in which Cardenas was killed and the timing of his death - April 17 and 18 are days that call for a human sacrifice on a "satanic calendar" - have stirred talked of occult activity in Donna.
   Chapa will also be tried on capital murder charges as an adult. The maximum penalty he faces is a life sentence because he was a juvenile at the time of the killing. Six others are accused of helping to cover up the crime.
   

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  © 1999 Corpus Christi Caller Times, a Scripps Howard newspaper. All rights reserved.