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Wave of support for US mother awaiting execution
The looming execution of a US mother-of-14 -- sentenced to death in a controversial case for the murder of her toddler daughter -- has provoked backlash.
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This handout picture from State Representative Jeff Leach shows Melissa Lucio (C) bowing her head in prayer during a meeting with a bipartisan group of Texas lawmakers at Gatesville Correctional Facility, Texas, on April, 6, 2022. (AFP/Handout/State Representative Jeff Leach)
T
he looming execution of a US mother-of-14 -- sentenced to death in a controversial case for the murder of her toddler daughter -- has provoked backlash from celebrities like Kim Kardashian and a growing movement that reaches well beyond US borders.
Melissa Lucio is to be put to death on April 27 for the 2007 murder of her two-year-old daughter Mariah, whose body was found at the family home covered in bruises, days after falling down stairs.
Pregnant with twins at the time, Lucio's life had been marred by both physical and sexual assault, drug addiction and financial insecurity. She was immediately suspected by police of having hit her daughter and questioned at length, just hours after the death.
After saying "that she hadn't done it nearly a hundred times," at 3:00 am she made a "completely extorted" confession, according to Sabrina Van Tassel, director of the hit documentary "The State of Texas vs. Melissa," which came out in 2020.
"I guess I did it," Lucio eventually told her interrogators when questioned about the presence of the bruises.
That confession was "the only thing they had against her," said Van Tassel, convinced that "there is nothing that connects Melissa Lucio to the death of this child, there is no DNA, no witness."
During the trial, a doctor said it was the "absolute worst" case of child abuse he had seen.
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