Another upcoming execution that gives me great pause - foreman now says they got it wrong

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Family members gather in February seeking to stop this month’s scheduled exeuction of Melissa Lucio.

In 2008, I served on the jury that sent Melissa Lucio to death row for the alleged murder of her 2-year-old daughter. Even at the time of trial, when it seemed to me that Lucio’s defense lawyers were hardly making a case for her life, I did not want to sentence her to death. I felt pressured by my fellow jurors to vote for a death sentence, but I wish I had never done so.

At the trial, prosecutors argued Lucio had been physically abusive toward her daughter, Mariah — the youngest of her 12 children. They noted the bruises and other injuries found on her body when Mariah was brought to the hospital and later declared dead. The majority of their prosecution, however, rested on Lucio’s confession, the result of five hours of interrogation.

But there were so many other details that went unmentioned. It wasn’t until after the trial was over that troubling information was brought to light.

Now, less than a month away from her planned execution, I feel deep regret. Since learning about all the things we jurors were never told when we held Lucio’s life in our hands, I see her as a woman who had a hard life and many struggles, who could have been anyone in my community.

I did not know that her long history of physical and sexual abuse made her vulnerable to falsely confess when subjected to aggressive interrogation tactics on the night of her daughter’s death. No one took us through the interrogation to show us how many times she asserted her innocence (over 100) or how she repeated the same words the interrogators fed to her. No evidence was presented of that and it would have mattered to me.

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I hope that the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles recommends clemency and Gov. Greg Abbott grants it to prevent the irreversible tragedy of Lucio’s execution from taking place.