A little bio on Mr. Cantu ....interesting....
A loose band of tough kids called the Grey Eagles, of which Cantu became a leader, despite being rather small and in special-ed classes at school. By age 15, he was stealing cars for an organized auto theft ring, often spending days at a time driving stolen cars to Mexico for cash. At a time when the San Antonio Police Department was embroiled in scandal, with vigilantes and drug-dealing officers well known to the community, Cantu was stealing cars and dodging the police. His older brother had been arrested on drug and theft charges, but despite several run-ins with the police, Ruben was never convicted of anything before the November 1984 crime that led to his execution.
Convicted of armed robbery and murder
The prosecution's case at the trial that convicted Ruben Cantu is summarized as follows: On the night of November 8, 1984, at approximately 11:30 p.m., Ruben Cantu (age 17 at the time) and his friend David Garza (15), broke into a vacant San Antonio house under construction at 605 Briggs Street, and robbed two Hispanic males at gunpoint. The two victims, Pedro Gomez (25) and Juan Moreno (19), had been workmen sleeping on floor mattresses at a construction site, guarding against burglary, as a water heater had been recently stolen from the work site. The two victims were sleeping in their work clothes, with their pockets full of their cash earnings at the time of the robbery. Cantu and Garza were carrying a rifle, which they used to rob the two men of their wristwatches. As they tried to take their cash, they were interrupted by Gomez's attempt to retrieve a pistol hidden under his mattress. Gomez was shot at least nine times by the boys' rifle, dying instantly, and Moreno was also shot as many as nine times by the same rifle. Thinking they had killed both men, the two teens then fled the scene. Juan Moreno survived the attack, and was able to leave the house and call for help shortly after the event, though he lost one lung, one kidney, and part of his stomach.
Juan Moreno was the key eyewitness in the trial, eventually identifying Ruben Cantu as the killer in court, only to recant his story a decade after Cantu was executed.
Police allegedly pressure a witness after a bar fight
According to Juan Moreno, and consistent with police records, he was visited by police in the hospital the day after the shooting. But, due to the severity his wounds, he was unable to speak and could barely move. Five days later, in a second interview, Moreno was shown a number of photos. Cantu's photo was not included and Moreno did not identify any of the people shown in the photos. On December 16, detectives visited Moreno a third time and showed him another array of five photos, including one of Ruben Cantu, who lived across the street from Moreno's job site where the crime occurred. He did not identify Ruben or anyone else from the photos shown to him during that police interview.
The case went cold, and no suspect was arrested. About four months after the robbery-murder, there was an unrelated evening incident at the Scabaroo Lounge, a bar near Cantu's home. Officer Joe De La Luz, an off-duty, plainclothes police officer carrying two concealed weapons, claimed to have been shot by Cantu in an unprovoked incident at that bar. According to the account given by Cantu and corroborated by others at the scene, a dispute arose over a game of pool, De La Luz threatened Cantu, flashed a pistol, and did not identify himself as a police officer. Cantu, who was also armed, shot De La Luz. Officer De La Luz survived the shooting.
His friend, Sgt. Bill Ewell, re-opened the Gomez homicide case on the day of that bar shooting. On the following day, Sgt. Ewell sent an investigator to Juan Moreno a fourth time, this time showing Cantu's photo along with four others. Again, Juan Moreno did not identify Cantu as one of his attackers. But he did provide Cantu's name. One day later, a third homicide detective picked up Moreno (an undocumented immigrant from Mexico at the time), drove him to the police station, sat him down and showed him the same group of photos that included Cantu. On that final attempt, Moreno positively identified the photo of Cantu as being one of his attackers.
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Somehow, I just can't drum up too much pity for this kid....maybe justice works in mysterious ways....
