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       #Post#: 419--------------------------------------------------
       ~ Abel Ochoa, 06Feb20, (TX) ~
       By: BuzzC Date: February 6, 2020, 8:05 pm
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       Texas executes Abel Ochoa, who killed five family members in
       Dallas shooting--
       Ochoa was sentenced to death after the slayings in Dallas of his
       relatives, including his two young daughters. His defense argued
       he was in a cocaine-induced delirium.
       Thursday, February 6, 2020
       Texas executed Abel Ochoa on Thursday for fatally shooting his
       family members in their living room.
       In 2002, Ochoa walked out of his Dallas bedroom, high on crack,
       and shot his 7-year-old and 9-month-old daughters, wife,
       father-in-law and two sisters-in-law, court records state.
       
       The only survivor was one of his wife’s sisters, who ran to a
       neighbor’s house after being shot.
       Police arrested a cooperative Ochoa soon afterward, and he
       confessed to shooting his relatives. He told police he “couldn’t
       handle the stress anymore,” according to court rulings.
       
       Nine months later, a Dallas County jury convicted him and
       sentenced him to death for the murders of his wife and oldest
       daughter. At 47, Ochoa had been on death row for nearly 17
       years.
       Shortly after 6 p.m., Ochoa was strapped to a gurney in the
       Huntsville death chamber. Several relatives of his wife watched
       the execution through a pane of glass, according to a prison
       spokesperson. Just before he was injected with a lethal dose of
       pentobarbital, he spoke his final words.
       "I would like to thank God, my dad, my Lord Jesus savior for
       saving me and changing my life," he said. "I want to apologize
       to my in-laws for causing all this emotional pain. I love y’all
       and consider y’all my sisters I never had. I want to thank you
       for forgiving me."
       He was pronounced dead at 6:48 p.m., 23 minutes after the drugs
       entered his system.
       Ochoa and his wife, Cecilia, were married nearly nine years.
       About two years before the murders, he started smoking crack, he
       said at trial. Over time, his drug use escalated. He took money
       from his wife and took out small loans to buy drugs. Months
       before the shooting, he walked off the job he had for more than
       a decade, court records state.
       Ochoa tried to quit smoking crack with his family’s help. Before
       the killings, he had not smoked for 10 days. But on an August
       Sunday, after his family attended church, he convinced his wife
       to let him buy a small amount to curb his physical cravings,
       according to court filings on his testimony. He bought $10 worth
       of crack and smoked it in the backyard while his family gathered
       inside. He then went into his bedroom and came out about 20
       minutes later with the family’s gun.
       “The gun was already loaded, and I walked into the living room
       where my family was,” he wrote in his police statement. “I
       started shooting while they were all sitting on the couch.”
       At trial, Dallas County prosecutors argued Ochoa had never
       gotten over learning years earlier that his wife had a child
       before they were together and kept it secret from him. The
       sister who survived the shooting said Ochoa became meaner and
       more aggressive toward his wife afterward. On a phone call
       recorded shortly after he learned of the child, he is heard
       threatening to shoot his wife, according to court filings.
       A psychiatrist who testified for the prosecution said the small
       amount Ochoa smoked was “quite unlikely” to have brought on
       delirium.
       “I think it’s a matter of anger. I think he was extremely
       frustrated with his situation,” Richard Coons, the state’s
       forensic psychiatrist, testified.
       The U.S. Supreme Court rejected his final appeal just before 6
       p.m. Thursday.
       Ochoa was the second person executed in Texas in 2020 and the
       third in the nation. Seven more men are set to be executed in
       Texas through May.
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