Kim Kardashian, who has made a name for herself as a criminal justice reform advocate, mourned the Wednesday execution in Texas of Ivan Cantu, 50, who was convicted of murdering his cousin and his cousin’s fiancee.
His death by lethal injection came just hours after Idaho delayed the execution of serial killer Thomas Eugene Creech because a medical team reportedly failed to find a vein into which they could insert the IV carrying the lethal dose.
Cantu died more than 20 years after his conviction, while Creech, 73, is one of the longest serving death-row inmates in the country.
Up until his last moments of life, celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Martin Sheen were advocating for a halt on Cantu’s the execution.
To her hundreds of millions of followers on Instagram, Kim wrote that she believes Cantu was ‘an innocent man.’
‘My prayers go out to his family and loved ones and everyone involved,’ she wrote.
The state of Texas has executed Ivan Cantu, 50, who was convicted of murdering his cousin and his cousin’s fiancee
To her hundreds of millions of followers on Instagram , Kim wrote that she believes Cantu was ‘an innocent man’
Thomas Eugene Creech, 73, had his execution in Idaho delayed Wednesday after the medical team failed eight times to find a vein
Cantu died by lethal injection on Wednesday evening, his time of death was recorded as 6.47pm according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
His legal team has argued that Cantu was framed for the double-killing in 2000 and that new evidence would have proven his innocence.
Up until the moment of his death, Cantu’s advocates were fighting for a halt on the execution so that the inmate could argue he was deprived of a fair trial.
In his telling, he was framed by those who were actually responsible for the killing his cousin James Mosqueda, and Mosquenda’s fiancee, Amy Kitchen in 2000.
Prior to his death, the convicted killer received the backing of celebrity criminal justice reform advocate Kim Kardashian, as well as actor Martin Sheen, who’d hoped to stall the court-mandated killing.
The reality star tweeted about Cantu’s case last month before mistakenly sharing a picture to her Instagram of a New York father who she’d incorrectly ID’d as the death row inmate.
The reality star and business mogul frequently advocates for death row inmates – she’s been a vocal criminal justice reform activist for the last five years.
Cantu’s fingerprint was found on the magazine inside the gun that was used to kill Mosqueda and Kitchen.
DNA analysis also showed blood on jeans found in Cantu’s trash can belonged to the victims.
Since his trial, however, Cantu and his attorneys have claimed that false testimony was presented at trial by a key witness for the state, who has since recanted.
They also claim that Cantu was the victim of ineffective assistance of counsel, predicated in large part on his trial attorney’s failure to call a single witness during the guilt-innocence phase of his trial.
Prosecutors, however, reject these claims and others, arguing repeatedly that they have not seen or heard anything that would ‘impugn the integrity of the guilty verdict.’
Greg Willis, the District Attorney of Collin County, says he remains ‘fully convinced’ of Cantu’s guilt.
‘It’s my firm belief that justice has been done in this case and that a Collin County jury’s verdict should be carried out on February 28th,’ he said ahead of the execution.
Creech’s execution was delayed in the latest example of a state struggling to carry out the process because of an inability to establish an IV line
In contrast to Cantu, Creech, in Idaho, did not die Wednesday evening. He’s been on death row for more than four decades.
The 73-year-old was first imprisoned in 1974 and has since been convicted of five murders across three states. He is suspected of several more.
He had already been sentenced to life behind bars in 1981, when he beat 22-year-old David Dale Jensen, a fellow inmate, to death. It was for that crime that he would be sentenced to execution.
According to reports, three volunteer medical team members tried eight times to establish an IV. Sites in the killer’s arms, legs, hands and feet were all tested.
The attempts began around 10am and were halted by the warden at just before 11am.
The state’s Department of Corrections said its death warrant for Creech was going to expire and that it was considering next steps.
Attorneys for the death row convict immediately filed a fresh motion for a stay, arguing the ‘badly botched execution attempt’ demonstrates the department’s ‘inability to carry out a humane and constitutional execution.’
The would-be execution team was made up entirely of volunteers, some of whom had medical training, but all of whose identities were kept under wraps.
They were white face coverings and navy scrub caps so their faces could not be seen. It would have been the state’s first execution in 12 years.
