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The Desert Killer
106 Plays2 years ago
In 1987, a shocking discovery launched a long investigation in the desert outside El Paso, Texas. The case of 6 murdered young women ended in a conviction--but no closure. Join Siera and Kayley as they cover their first serial killer case: The Desert Killer.
https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/archives/2017/08/10/1987-4th-body-identified-dawn-smith/480561001/
https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/archives/2017/08/10/1988-david-wood-ready-fight/481038001/
https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/archives/2017/08/10/1991-desert-deaths-trial-set-open/481307001/
https://apnews.com/article/de6a76455abbc93a619563e37e1d5400
Brief from the Supreme Court:
https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-9262/112415/20190814184654950_Wood%20Second%20BIO%20ID.pdf
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Transcript
Introduction to the Episode
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi, I'm Cierra. And I'm Kaley. And this is True Crime and Punishment. Episode four. Today, Cierra will be telling us about the desert killer, David Leonard Wood.
00:00:13
Speaker
That's right. And this story is a doozy.
Complexities in the Case
00:00:16
Speaker
There are a lot of details and we're actually not going to be able to hit all of them, I think in this episode, but we will have links to everything. Many, many links for you to look at later. There were a few discrepancies that I found like some details as far as when discoveries were made. Also one that I'll briefly mention about
00:00:35
Speaker
what actually got him put into jail. There were kind of two reports, so we'll talk a little bit about that. But again, like I said, I'll be putting lots of links in the show notes for people to look at. Excellent. I love lots of links. Just to point out, this is the podcast first serial killer. He is, yes. All right, Sarah, take it away.
Discovery of the Bodies
00:00:53
Speaker
Our story begins on September 3rd, 1987 in El Paso, Texas. Frank Brooks was an employee of El Paso Water Utilities and he was working around 9 a.m., but he was also searching for arrowheads near his company's pump in the desert when he made a discovery that would haunt him for the rest of his life. While picking up some trash, he found a human hand sticking out of the ground.
00:01:17
Speaker
Naturally, Brooks kind of freaked out. The company contacted the police and they arrived on the scene. Now, a couple of articles that I looked at, they said that he discovered the body on the third police came on the fourth was what it looked like. But then some places discovery and the police's discovery both on September 4th. So there's a little bit of a discrepancy there in the articles that I looked at. But whatever the case, when the police arrived very shortly after, they discovered not one, but two bodies.
00:01:47
Speaker
Oh, wow. Both had been buried in shallow graves. The cause of death and the victim's identities could not be determined right away. However, when people began to learn about the bodies that have been discovered, Mary Baker, a woman who lived in El Paso, heard about it and she just knew that one of those bodies had to be her daughter, Karen, age 20.
00:02:09
Speaker
Karen had gone missing on June 5, 1987, and Mary had been trying to find her. She had actually gone to the FBI because she believed that her daughter had been kidnapped and taken to Mexico. But they discovered nothing from that. Is there a reason that she thought she'd been taken to Mexico?
00:02:27
Speaker
I couldn't find reason why she thought it. I think she was just very surprised. Karen actually had three children, very small. Apparently, she had disappeared from home a couple of times. But according to Mary, Karen was really getting her life back together. I believe if I remember correctly, she was training to become a cosmetologist, like she was really just starting to pick her life back up. And so Mary felt like something really bad must have happened.
Community Response to Disappearances
00:02:50
Speaker
She and several mothers in the area became upset with how police were handling disappearances because at least three girls were reported missing between June and July and other girls have been disappearing as well. So Mary Baker and other mothers held a protest on July 11th by the Stanton street bridge to draw attention to the issue of missing children. Marsha Wheatley was one of the other mothers in attendance and she will be important later.
00:03:15
Speaker
her 15 year old daughter Desiree had disappeared also in June, just after she had graduated from junior high school. The police had labeled Desiree's case as a runaway, but Marsha believed that was completely incorrect. Her daughter was not a runaway. She had no reason to run away. So she and Mary Baker and other parents felt that the police were not handling the disappearances correctly. So we're back in September now.
Identification of the Victims
00:03:40
Speaker
Mary Baker had just heard the news. She was certain it was her daughter.
00:03:44
Speaker
it did turn out one of the bodies was indeed the body of Karen Baker. The other victim was Rosa Maria Casio, age 24, a waitress and dancer who had been visiting her sister Esperanza. She had been reported missing on August 20th. Her body was not as badly decomposed as Karen Baker's. The coroner also suspected that she had died of asphyxiation
00:04:06
Speaker
her jaw was broken in two places. The police started investigating, but there didn't seem to be anything really to connect the victims except location. Like they were both in the El Paso area. They were both buried in a similar place. Now the police are trying to figure all of this out. The community is obviously very nervous because first, earlier in the summer, their daughters have been disappearing and then now these two bodies show up. But in the midst of all this, the police have other things to worry about as well.
00:04:34
Speaker
On September 22, 1987, a woman named Judith Kelling Brown came to police and said that a man had picked her up and offered to give her a ride home. Instead of giving her a ride home, however, he drove her out to the desert, bound her, and raped her. He would have killed her, but he thought he heard people approaching so he abandoned her and fled the scene.
00:04:56
Speaker
According to the article that I read, the event occurred between July 26 and August 7, but Brown contacted the police 18 days after the bodies of Cassio and Baker were discovered. Police had Brown lead them to the area where she had been assaulted, and it was very close to where the first two graves were discovered. Police showed her photos of criminals who had conducted similar crimes in the past, and she pointed to one of them that she recognized.
Suspect Identification
00:05:22
Speaker
It was a photo of a man named David Leonard Wood,
00:05:25
Speaker
age 30. Now fast forward to October 20, 1987. Two more shallow graves were discovered. The first victim to be identified was 15-year-old Desiree Wheatley, the daughter of Marsha Wheatley. The second victim was later identified as Dawn Marie Smith, age 14. She had run away in June of 1987, but had not been reported missing until September 10.
00:05:54
Speaker
From what I read, it sounded like she often ran away, but she finally dropped out of contact around September. Gotcha. On October 23rd, so three days later, David Leonard Wood was arrested and charged with sexual assault in the case of Judith Kelling Brown. So he's arrested purely for what he did to Judith Brown.
00:06:15
Speaker
By October 24th, the El Paso Times was revealing a little bit more information about this David Leonard Wood. Apparently he had a history of violence that went all the way back to 1976.
00:06:28
Speaker
In 1977, when Wood was 19 years old, he pled guilty to charges of indecency with a child in August of 1976. So he's been all over the criminal spectrum from a very young age. Yes. He was sentenced to five years, but he only served three and a half years of that sentence before he was released. Then on June 19th, 1980, so just after he was released pretty much, he was charged with the rape of a 13 year old girl and a 19 year old.
00:06:57
Speaker
He was sentenced to 20 years for each crime, but the sentences were supposed to run concurrently.
00:07:03
Speaker
So he would only serve 20 years, he wouldn't be serving 40. Right. Got it. Then on January 15th, 1987, so about seven years into that sentence, he was released on parole to El Paso, Texas and he moved in with his father. He reportedly frequented bars and some less than reputable establishments. He liked to hang out with the motorcycle crowd and he was reportedly quite popular with the ladies of various ages.
00:07:28
Speaker
Oh, not good. Now the El Paso Times is reporting this after he's been arrested. And they're obviously, as a newspaper, they're not saying that he is a suspect in the case. The police were not calling him a suspect in the case, but it is interesting. So at this point, he's been arrested for the assault on Judith Brown. Right. So it's sexual crime. It's all sexual crime. Yes. Actual assault. Yes. Okay.
00:07:55
Speaker
Then on November 3rd, 1987, the body of 17-year-old Angelica Jeanette Frosto was uncovered in the desert. She had been reported missing on September 6th. She was last seen in her neighborhood on July 3rd. Her grandmother filed the report. The article didn't say why she waited until September to file, but it did say that Angelica didn't live at home. She would just stop there to change clothes and things, so maybe her grandmother didn't think it was odd until she heard about these bodies keep showing up.
00:08:24
Speaker
or had it been a while.
Media and Public Perception
00:08:26
Speaker
Gotcha. Yeah. So at this point, five bodies have been discovered. David Leonard Wood is in custody for the assault on Judith Kelly Brown. 1988 rolls around. By this time at the start of 1988, Wood is considered a suspect in the five murders. Just because he is in fact a rapist and has pedophilia in his criminal history.
00:08:48
Speaker
There's some connections and we're going to get into that. And then also Judith Brown took them to the place where she was assaulted and it was right by where the first two graves had been found. So they're starting to put all these things together. So the El Paso Times early in 1988 decided to interview Wood and get his perspective now that he is a murder suspect. And here is part of the article's description. David Leonard Wood has this nervous laugh and these soft blue eyes that look out of place on a worn sunken cheeked face.
00:09:17
Speaker
He rolls his smokes methodically, pinching tobacco from an old plastic peanut butter tub onto white, gummed, bugler, or bugler, cigarette paper. Then he puffs, facing intently ahead, and his eyes are the only softness about him. Okay, I'm gonna comment as someone who's done journalistic work. You do write details like that when you're writing a profile. You want to describe your main character, so to speak, but as a
00:09:43
Speaker
convicted rapist, convicted pedophile, and murder suspect, it is an odd angle to take, to consider any part of him soft. I feel like that's odd phrasing. It was odd phrasing. It definitely is more of a profile piece, but I just felt like the writing throughout, and they describe him more. Apparently he had several tattoos that they described, including one of the face of Jesus, which I personally found disturbing. Yeah, I mean...
00:10:10
Speaker
I didn't like the drippy way they were, I shouldn't say drippy. I don't know that that was the author's intent, but it just felt a little bit drippy to me, especially because the El Paso Times had reported his criminal history, like he has hurt women and children. When you say drippy, what do you mean by that? It's just very, drippy is not the right word, so descriptive, like just very, they're trying to make it sound like a story. And again, they're trying to show him as a character.
00:10:35
Speaker
which you do have to represent the people who do these things but again i'm going to say it's an odd angle to take to incorporate some sort of softness into someone who is a murder suspect because one thing we stress is bias when you come in and you're describing someone gently who is under suspicion of terrible acts you are automatically writing a bias into that piece
00:10:55
Speaker
And I'm not saying they should say the harsh, little-eyed man with his violent hands and a twinge in his eye that just spoke of evil. You don't want to write that either, because that's still bias. If you were going to write a profile about a suspected serial killer, maybe after he's been convicted, you can try and do a flip where you start with, oh, he's so soft. He's got gentle eyes, too. He's actually hurt several people. But you're right, it does come across as very artsy, a little bit too kind, a little bit too biased.
00:11:24
Speaker
And this could just be my perspective as someone who is doing all the research. So like, I know he's the guy at this point. It just struck me as odd. I mean, even if he's not the murderer, he's assaulted children. And he's apparently assaulted Judith Brown, but listen to this. According to the article, Wood said those charges, the ones about the case of Judith Brown, are just excuses to keep him locked up while detectives search for something concrete to link him with the bodies found in the desert.
00:11:53
Speaker
You've been arrested for assaulting a minor in a 19-year-old. No, Judith Brown. Oh, you mean in the past. I'm sorry. In the past, you've been arrested. So even if I understand what he's saying, that he's a trumped up charge and they're trying to connect him to the murders. But you are not an innocent man. This is not the world against you. It sounds like the author of the piece is almost trying to drum up some sympathy. I think that's probably a little bit odd. And to basically say, oh, my victim is not a victim. Anyway.
00:12:22
Speaker
Well, it gets better. The article also tells us that Wood has pinned the title number one bad guy on himself because he's the suspect. He claimed that he was guilty by association. Police were attempting to link him to the five victims and to three other missing girls who to this day have not been found. According to the article, he said he had met one of three young women who now are listed as missing and three of the victims found in the desert. And he dated a girl who resembled one of the others.
00:12:49
Speaker
And he said, I'm the first to admit that what you see here is very damning, and it really sets me up. And that's what leads the police to believe I'm the guy. But he also said that he didn't do it. He said it's something that he couldn't possibly do except in self-defense, but it's something he's certain he will be indicted for. If they have no evidence, no suspects, no leads, they're going to go for the underdog. I'm the underdog, Wood said.
00:13:12
Speaker
There's nothing that ties me in. No clothes, no hair, no fingerprints, no tire tracks, no nothing. How can they tie you to something you didn't do? That's very true. If you didn't do it, that would be tragic. But I'm getting the feeling, based on the title of this episode, that he's probably not as innocent as he is saying that he is. And if there is no concrete evidence, that does happen. Unfortunately, we do have cases in the United States where people have been waylaid by people in power, and that is unfortunate.
00:13:42
Speaker
but if it walks like a duck and it talks like a duck and there is physical evidence proving that the duck was there because if you pull a bait and switch on me you tell me at the end of this he's not actually the guy um and i don't think there will be a bait and switch he goes on to say i feel like telling them the police something really not nice these guys sit there with their smug little faces they're smiling at me and trying to insinuate i'm a killer
00:14:06
Speaker
They know the pain and the harassment they put my family through. They know everything they've done to me in my life, and they're enjoying it." So he has this very, very, wow, the whole world is against me, the whole police force is against me kind of view. And he said, if I had a list of every girl that I met in Northeast, it would be about 14 or 15 pages. And the article said this, some of those girls remain his staunch supporters, and they interviewed some of these supporters.
00:14:29
Speaker
One girl they interviewed said, I know David and he's not that kind. He's generous. He's understanding. He's the kind of guy you can really talk to. This staunch supporter was a 16 year old girl. They did not publish her name. So she's a minor. She is a minor. And he is at this time 30. And they have a history. And you know what? No one has ever said that SEO killer was charming and kind and there for them. And they could never do that. You know, like Ted Bundy.
00:14:59
Speaker
I know that there were several things of this that gave me, we're actually going to get into that more that reminded me of Ted Bundy. But this girl who remains unnamed, probably because she's, you know, a minor, said that she met Wood in June four months before his October 24th arrest. They spent their dates at magic landing, watching Diablo's fireworks or playing video games at a pizza place. Did it frighten her that police thought Wood might be involved in the deaths? She said, it did at first. Then I thought to myself, no way. He couldn't have done it. David?
00:15:28
Speaker
No, he's too sweet. She said she and Wood often double dated with her best friend, a 17-year-old Northeast El Paso girl, and Wood's 26-year-old brother Randy. The 17-year-old girl said, honestly, I think he didn't do it. I mean, he treated us both great. He was a very caring person.
00:15:46
Speaker
He's a convicted rapist. And your children. Yeah, that's the thing. These are minors. This is a huge issue. A huge red flag. That's unfortunate because sometimes when you're younger and you just think, wow, this older guy's into me, I'm so mature. No, he's a predator. And you need to run. This was in the 80s, right? Yes, this was in the 80s. So it's not like it was in an era where it's just like, oh yeah, my husband's 30 years older than me and that's fine.
00:16:11
Speaker
No, this was the 80s and I'm just glad that that 16 year old and that 17 year old didn't end up out in the shallow graves. So going into a little further in detail to the article, Wood claimed that the police started looking into him because he had links to Cheryl Lynn Vasquez-Dismuks. She was a 19 year old girl who had married the convict Robert Dismuks by proxy about a week before she disappeared on June 28th. She is one of the three girls that went missing and has still to this day not been found.
00:16:39
Speaker
Some people placed Wood in the area the day that Cheryl disappeared. However, he claims he had nothing to do with it. In fact, he actually helped look for her when he found out that she had gone missing. And apparently he knew her sister-in-law Mona because Mona visited Wood after he was arrested. She was eventually banned from the county jail because she wrote, I love David Wood on the wall of one of the visiting booths.
00:17:04
Speaker
Hmm, because a murderer has never joined in the search party for someone that they've murdered. Well, they're saying that the evidence against him is circumstantial, but the evidence for him is also kind of like, he's just such a nice guy. He'd never do that. I mean, he'd rape a 14 year old, sure, but like... Yeah, and I would say the testimony of a 16 year old girl, she's probably being manipulated. It's not very strong evidence in his favor.
00:17:29
Speaker
Which again, if there's no physical evidence, you know, right, the police might be putting it on him because maybe he has a previous criminal history. But it's very, very odd. This is a very odd article. It is a very odd article. He also mentioned Desiree Wheatley, the 15-year-old who disappeared.
00:17:49
Speaker
He said, they got some reports from some kids that said when there was a crowd one night at a Circle K out by my house that Desiree Wheatley was there and I was there with some people. This is the one time they said that I had met Desiree, one time only. No one's ever said I've been out with her. Nobody's ever said I even talked to her. They just said I was there. I dated every night, you know, somebody different. So how do I know if I ever talked to Desiree Wheatley or not?
00:18:14
Speaker
You don't remember the names of the people that you dated? He said it could be 14 to 15 pages. That's a lot of names, Kaylee. He was a popular guy.
00:18:24
Speaker
So that was the, that's a very short version of the article. Obviously there's more, but there's a lot of that. There's a lot of him saying, well, it's just hearsay, all of this stuff, you know, and the police are out to get me. And then on March 14th of 1988, a couple was looking for aluminum cans in the desert when they discovered the body of Ivy Susanna Williams, age 23. So now a sixth victim has been discovered.
00:18:46
Speaker
On March 17th, 1988, Wood was convicted of sexual assault against Judith Kelling Brown, aggravated kidnapping and violating parole, and he was sentenced to 50 years in prison. So he was sentenced for the assault. This was not for the murders, still a suspect.
00:19:02
Speaker
In the articles I looked at, sometimes there was also mentioned an attempted kidnapping. One article said of a nine-year-old, but that was the only article I saw, so I don't know if that's valid. And then another one said he attempted to kidnap another grown woman who made it out of his truck.
00:19:20
Speaker
but I didn't see a lot. There were a few articles that said that, but not every article. So I'm not certain if that was also something he was convicted for at this time. Most of the articles made it sound like he was just convicted for the assault on Judith. Wood was also considered a suspect in the disappearances of the following three girls. Marjorie Knox, age 14, she disappeared in February of 1987. Melissa Alaniz, age 13, disappeared in March of 1987. And Cheryl Lynn Vasquez-Dismukes,
00:19:49
Speaker
age 19, disappeared in June of 1987. Now, something interesting is that Melissa Alaniz and Desiree Wheatley, who was one of the victims, attended H.E. Charles Middle School, and then Cheryl Vasquez-Dismubes had also been a student there. The school was near Woods' home.
00:20:07
Speaker
Which this was before the sex offender registry, and I think before the rules where sex offenders couldn't live within a certain distance of schools. But that was also very sad to me because perhaps he had seen them before from there. Who knows? This is also a bit random, but on May 27th, 1988, Wood got married. He married Valerie A. Traitor. I couldn't find much information on her, but they got divorced three years later.
00:20:34
Speaker
Was this while he was in prison? This was while he was in prison. And a murder suspect. Not a confirmed murderer, but a murder suspect. Well, wow. So what you said earlier about Ted Bundy. A little close to home there, I guess. A little bit, yeah. Then in November of 1988, Wood attempted to sue police for harassing him and treating him like a scapegoat.
The Trial Proceedings
00:20:55
Speaker
Then on July 13th, 1990, a grand jury indicted Wood on serial murder charges. Now the El Paso Times reported that the county officials predicted the trial would end up costing anywhere from one to three million dollars.
00:21:11
Speaker
and it would be the lower figure if the trial was held in El Paso, and the higher one if they had to move it because a jury couldn't be found in the area. Because of jury bias? Yes. And there was concerns that they would have to move it, which would be very expensive. So the trial judge, District Judge Peter Pekka, asked the El Paso news organizations to leave some facts out of their reporting of the case, specifically Wood's prior criminal record, which
00:21:37
Speaker
I could see from wanting to get a non-biased jury, I could understand why he would ask that.
00:21:43
Speaker
According to the El Paso Times, media representatives refused to honor the request because it would limit their First Amendment rights. Hmm. Interestingly enough, oftentimes in a court of law, you're not allowed to use a suspect's criminal history against them or even bring it up as evidence. A lot of times it's ruled inadmissible because it taints the jury's opinion. So I completely understand asking them to keep it out of the media. Also, oftentimes when it comes to investigation, they ask them to leave out key details just because it can affect prosecution going forward.
00:22:12
Speaker
and get in the way of justice. And I'm pro-journalism, but I think sometimes you need to take a step back and think about the greater picture. Right, because although, yes, they have their First Amendment rights, he also has the right to an unbiased jury of his peers. Exactly. And it is interesting to me talking about the journalism because from the beginning, even before he was named as a suspect in the police's murder investigation,
00:22:33
Speaker
The El Paso Times is already pointing out the connection between, oh, he took Judith Brown to this location near where the first two graves were found, and here's his criminal history. They were already without actually saying he's guilty. They were kind of putting it all together. Guilty by association, trying to do some journalistic investigation.
00:22:52
Speaker
Right, but obviously without all-in-out libel, they weren't saying he was guilty. But I could see how people in the area would definitely be persuaded that he was guilty. Yeah, that's a big deal because I can get in the way of justice. Excellent grounds for appeal to say by a story. Oh no. No, don't worry. He didn't get appeals on that grounds, but he did go for many appeals.
00:23:13
Speaker
But anyway, unfortunately for our district judge, Woods trial did have to get moved. It got moved to Dallas. Before we get into the actual trial itself, I did want to mention this cool fact from the El Paso Times. During the investigation, the police department interviewed 400 people and investigated 50 suspects. Detectives traveled to Florida, Utah, and Mexico to follow up on leads.
00:23:36
Speaker
They consulted with FBI profilers and used aircraft with heat-sensing equipment to comb the desert for more victims. So they didn't just pick one guy and say, this is it? Oh, no, no, no. He was the underdog. They were against him, Kaylee. Weren't you listening to what I read you earlier? That's why they went to Utah and Florida. Why else did you go to Utah and Florida?
00:23:57
Speaker
Except for some orange fibers found where Wheatley was buried, which the court did not allow jurors to consider, there was no physical evidence such as weapons, fingerprints, DNA, or clothing linking wood to the crimes, but the circumstantial evidence was considered overwhelming.
00:24:14
Speaker
The victims knew Wood or had met him through friends and he was seen with the young women before they disappeared. There were witnesses that actually said they had seen Desiree Wheatley get into his truck. I believe someone saw Karen Baker get into his truck. Perhaps the most compelling testimony at his trial came from Randy Wells and James Carl Sweeney Jr.
00:24:31
Speaker
These were prisoners who said that Wood told them he had killed the women. Wells said that Wood claimed to have killed 15 women. What do you think about jailhouse confessions or things like that? I tend to not put as much stock in them. Well, here's what else the article had to say. Both of Wood's cellmates had something to gain, one stood to collect a $25,000 reward, and prosecutors dropped a murder charge against the second one.
00:24:58
Speaker
That's why I don't mind stopping the jailhouse. Their testimony is suspect. However, one of Wood's lawyers said that the district judge made sure that Wood got a fair trial. In fact, the lawyer said, quote, he bent over backwards for the defense.
00:25:13
Speaker
good on that judge, that is exactly what should happen. Even if you think the person being prosecuted is the scum of the earth, they still deserve the rights of every other man. Absolutely. And the judge did do a good job. The defense made a few attempts to follow some other leads. There were some people who believed that Wood did not act alone. And there was also a man who had
00:25:34
Speaker
claimed to have killed some women in El Paso during the summer. The FBI were actually tracking that man down, but the FBI said that his report was not credible. And I'll put links to the articles that listed those as well, but eventually all the leads just came to dead ends. The trial began on October 21st, 1992.
00:25:54
Speaker
On November 10, 1992, the jurors convicted Wood and recommended the death penalty. His original execution date was January 14, 1993, but because of many appeals he filed, he was able to postpone it to August 20, 2009. 2009 rolls around. August 19, the day before his execution, Wood's lawyers requested to make another appeal.
00:26:19
Speaker
claiming that Wood should be exempt from the death penalty because he was intellectually disabled.
Appeals and Legal Challenges
00:26:25
Speaker
Not an uncommon defense. Did they have information to back that up? Yes and no. So this appeal for intellectual disability was based off Atkins versus Virginia, which was a Supreme Court case in which the Supreme Court ruled that executing a person with intellectual disabilities is cruel and unusual punishment.
00:26:44
Speaker
which would be a violation of the Eighth Amendment. For Wood's appeal, they used his proof, six very different IQ scores from tests taken at different times in his life. But it is important to note that all of these tests were taken after the age of 18. His first test was when he was 19.
00:27:01
Speaker
That's going to be important with the definition of intellectual disabilities, which we'll get to in a moment. Here are the IQ scores that he had. The first one that he took when he was 19, his score was 111. Another score was 64. Another was 71. Another was 101. The other one was 67. And then the final one was 57. There's a lot of fluctuation in these scores. And there usually is some standard error of measurement with IQ tests, but this was a very big gap.
00:27:30
Speaker
What would be considered an average IQ score? I believe average is 85 to 100 if I'm remembering correctly. Intellectual disability for not getting the death penalty is usually if they're under 70. I think sometimes the 70 to 75 range, there's some leeway there.
00:27:48
Speaker
So he was definitely well below it at 54. 57 was the lowest. But again, looking at these scores, a ton of fluctuation. And this very first IQ test he ever took, he got a score of 111. Interesting. Now, in 2014, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals stated that David Leonard Wood had not provided sufficient evidence that he was intellectually disabled. In that trial,
00:28:13
Speaker
He had only three lay witnesses, his sister, a childhood friend, and a school teacher who were his witnesses. And then he did use information from a psychologist, but the experts had since passed away. So they couldn't explain their findings or go into more detail.
00:28:29
Speaker
Right. Which he had been given time to find an expert witness so he could have had one testify for him but instead he had three lay people. Gotcha. In 2016 Woods team issued another appeal and requested additional DNA tests to be conducted on the victim's clothing and a knife that had been found among Woods belongings but the results of that were inconclusive.
00:28:50
Speaker
After the initial rejection in 2014, the Supreme Court had two other important rulings, which were Hall versus Florida and Moor 1 versus Texas. In Hall versus Florida, the court prohibited states in borderline cases from relying only on intelligence test scores to determine whether a death row inmate is eligible to be executed. States must look beyond IQ scores when inmate tests are in the range of 70 to 75.
00:29:16
Speaker
IQ tests have a margin of error and those inmates whose scores fall within the margin must be allowed to present other evidence of mental disability. Makes sense. More 1 versus Texas took place because of a list of factors known as the presentio factors. A criminal court of appeals in Texas had listed these factors to kind of be used in addition to IQ tests to determine if an individual really did have an intellectual disability or not.
00:29:42
Speaker
So the normal definitions or expectations were set by the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.
00:29:49
Speaker
and the American Psychiatric Association, which produces the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, which lists various mental illnesses or intellectual disabilities. The definitions from these expert groups looked for the following three criteria. There's significant sub-average intellectual functioning, usually defined as an IQ, that is two standard deviations below the mean, generally 70 or below, for the five point
00:30:14
Speaker
standard error measurement. Then number two, they need to have significant limitations in adaptive functioning. Normally this means a finding of significant deficits in two or more skill areas. So how they adapt to everyday life? Can they adjust? Can they carry out adult functions? And then number three, which is important, is onset in the developmental period typically considered to be before the age of 18. So they have to show significant adaptive difficulties prior to age 18.
00:30:42
Speaker
But all of his IQ tests were from 19 on up. Yes. Gotcha. Now these are the factors to define intellectual disability as determined by these experts. The Brezeno factors, which were determined by a court of law, added some other criteria. One, did those who knew the person best during the developmental stage, his family, friends, teachers,
00:31:03
Speaker
I think he was intellectually disabled at the time and if so, act in accordance with that determination. Two, has the person formulated plans and carried them through or is his conduct impulsive? Three, does his conduct show leadership or does it show that he is led around by others? Four, is his conduct in response to external stimuli rational and appropriate regardless of whether it is socially acceptable?
00:31:27
Speaker
Five, does he respond coherently, rationally, and on point to oral or written questions? Or do his responses wander from subject to subject? Six, can the person hide facts or lie effectively in his own or other's interests? Seven, putting aside any heinousness or gruesomeness surrounding the capital offense, did the commission of that offense require forethought, planning, and complex execution of purpose?
00:31:49
Speaker
In the case of Moore, the Supreme Court's majority decision was that the courts had placed undue emphasis on Briseno factors. So they said you can consider these things, but you shouldn't put too much emphasis on these factors because they're not related to the medical definition for intellectual disability.
00:32:05
Speaker
So the presentio factors, that's a court of law that's not from a medical professional. Correct. Right. And so in the case of Moore, one versus Texas, Moore's defense team was saying the courts were relying too heavily on these things. Our client actually does have an intellectual disability. Too much weight was placed on the presentio factors and the court ruled in his favor.
00:32:26
Speaker
After Moore 1 versus Texas was decided, Wood's team applied for a writ of certiorari to get the Supreme Court to overrule the Texas Criminal Court of Appeals decision, denying Wood's appeal. What is a writ of certiorari? That is an excellent question. It is a writ or order by which a higher court reviews a decision of a lower court. That's really interesting. I've heard of that situation, but never the term. I never heard of that term either.
00:32:55
Speaker
before this. And I actually was able to find, and we will link it in the show notes, but I was able to find the PDF of the state's brief in opposition. So this was a brief turned into the Supreme Court on behalf of the state to ask the court to refuse Wood's appeal to have the decision reconsidered.
00:33:13
Speaker
And it is a very long document, so we're not going to go through the whole thing. But essentially, the state is saying that Wood misunderstands more. One, Wood was saying that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals rely too heavily on presentio factors in his case. However, in this document, the state said that Wood never presented any reliable evidence of sub-average intellectual functioning, even if you're not relying on the presentio factors.
00:33:40
Speaker
He relied on old IQ scores from tests performed by deceased experts. Moreover, the state presented testimony from Dr. Thomas Allen, who conducted extensive testing, an evaluation of Wood, and a review of the entire record, concluding that Wood is not intellectually disabled.
00:33:57
Speaker
Dr. Allen found Wood to have an overall IQ of 75, which was likely an artificially low score because effort testing revealed that Wood was malingering, which is where you're pretending that a condition is worse than it actually is. According to this document, Wood has six documented IQ scores ranging from 64 to 111, none occurring before age 18.
00:34:20
Speaker
The earliest score was obtained when Wood was 19 years old, and that score was his highest, 111. The lowest score was obtained approximately three years later, in 1980, by Dr. Dale Johnson, who administered the first version of the Weschler Adult Intelligence Scale to Wood pursuant to a court-ordered evaluation for competency to stand trial on two counts of sexual assault.
00:34:42
Speaker
would have obtained a verbal IQ of 67, IQ of 64, and full-scale IQ of 64. Now, I will note that this is a little bit different than the other information I gave you. I saw one source that said his lowest score was 57. I'm more inclined to go with this since this is what was presented to the Supreme Court. I hope that was accurate.
00:35:01
Speaker
Now, those were the results of this test. However, Dr. Johnson also concluded that Wood had a potential maximum IQ of 80, which is above the range for intellectual disability. Less than a month later, Dr. Richard Walker performed a short form test on Wood and obtained a verbal IQ of 75, performance IQ of 69, and full scale IQ of 71.
00:35:24
Speaker
When Wood entered the Texas Department of Criminal Justice in August of 1980, his IQ was listed as 101, although the record contains no information about the kind of intelligence test performed. When Wood entered prison for a third time in 1988, his IQ was listed as 67, but again there was no information about the tests.
00:35:43
Speaker
The state court determined that Dr. Johnson's report and obtained IQ score of 64 were not credible. Dr. Johnson concluded that Wood's score placed him in the high end range of intellectual disability and indicated that Wood was incompetent to stand trial. But Dr. Johnson's assertion is contradictory because if Wood is capable of achieving an IQ score of 80, then he cannot possibly be intellectually disabled regardless of his obtained IQ scores. The court also found that Wood failed to supply the court with the tests
00:36:11
Speaker
subtests, or raw data forming the basis of Dr. Johnson's conclusions. And there is no indication Dr. Johnson conducted any effort testing to determine if Wood was malingering and we're going to get into what effort testing is in a moment. And Dr. Johnson's statement that Wood was capable of a maximum score of 80 indicates that Wood was not giving his best effort. Any wobble and error measurement could not be so large that a person's IQ range could go from mild intellectual disability to bright normal range of intellectual functioning.
00:36:41
Speaker
Now Dr. Allen, who was the state's expert who testified at the hearing, said he performed testing on Wood in order to assess his intelligence, achievement in school, and malingering. He would obtained a verbal comprehension score of 80, a perceptual reasoning score of 86, and a full-scale score of 75. The full-scale score of 75 does not meet the first prong of the diagnostic criteria for intellectual disability.
00:37:05
Speaker
Dr. Allen conducted two tests on wood to assess his effort. So the effort testers are basically measuring, is he actually doing his best or is he trying to get artificially low scores? Gotcha. Effort testing, according to this document, is necessary because one, capital defendants have an external incentive to perform poorly on IQ tests and two, it is not difficult to malinger on an IQ test and three, as effort declines, so do the IQ scores.
00:37:31
Speaker
According to Dr. Allen, Wood demonstrated poor effort and his poor effort was not due to genuine memory problems. His effort scores were worse than those in numerous comparison groups such as elderly patients with advanced dementia and children with developmental disorders and children with autism and IQs of 63. So basically, the expert who did testify against Wood said that he appeared to be artificially getting low scores.
00:37:57
Speaker
And the only witnesses he provided in his defense were lay witnesses and then testimony from deceased experts. Gotcha. So the state of Texas basically told the Supreme Court that this is not worth your time. He has not provided sufficient evidence of sub-average intellectual functioning. And the court did deny his appeal for a writ of certiorari. Interesting. Now to this day, no new execution date has been set. But he is still on death row.
00:38:26
Speaker
He is still on death row. Yes. This has caused some problems for the families of the victims, specifically the mother of Desiree Wheatley. She said, now this was a little while ago. This was after the case had been going on. This was the 30 year anniversary of the case. She said, justice delayed is justice denied. That sums up this case. And she said, I will be there when he is executed, even if I have to crawl there.
00:38:54
Speaker
I keep thinking it's been 30 years. This has gone on twice the number of years Desiree lived on this earth. That is a very powerful statement. Very sad. The whole story is very sad. Now from what I could tell, he was convicted by the jury
00:39:10
Speaker
It appears to have mostly been circumstantial evidence that was the reason for the conviction.
Evidential Debates and Sentencing
00:39:17
Speaker
Do they have any forensic evidence tying him to the situation? I believe there were some orange fibers found inside a vacuum in his apartment that matched fibers that were found on the victims. But there wasn't a ton of forensic evidence, it looks like, that supported the case. It was mostly circumstantial.
00:39:34
Speaker
The prosecution didn't have much by way of forensic evidence because just orange fibers, that's interesting. Fiber evidence never seems to be very strong evidence when it comes to forensic data. So the evidence, just to sum up to make sure I'm understanding this, so the evidence they had was he was seen with the victims.
00:39:52
Speaker
He was known to know the victims. He lived in close proximity to several of the victims. A couple of victims have been seen getting into his truck and Judith Kelling Brown showed police that her assault had taken place close to where the graves were found. And then of course there was the testimony of the two convicts. Right, okay. So circumstantial, circumstantial. Very little for him. Interesting.
00:40:15
Speaker
Yes. So essentially, it was Kellings testimony, the testimony from the convicts is what it sounds like. What are your thoughts? In general, I'm surprised he's, I'm not surprised that was his conviction. I'm surprised they haven't gone for a retrial based on lack of sufficient evidence.
00:40:30
Speaker
because it sounds like they're really trying to get him declared mentally incompetent. But based on the events they seem to have convicted him on, I'm surprised that his counsel wouldn't say, hey, this was a lack of evidence. It's all circumstantial. But I do know that it could be very difficult to reopen a case based on insufficient evidence when a jury has already found you guilty. I feel like I'm very dissatisfied.
00:40:49
Speaker
I'm sorry if it was anti-climactic. I mean, it's crazy. That's a lot of people. So he had six victims and then three suspected victims that were never found. Correct. And according to what one of the inmates reported, he said he had killed a total of 15, but either A, the convict could have been making that up or B, he had said that, but he was just, you know, bragging or making things up.
00:41:12
Speaker
Yeah, unfortunately serial killers are notorious liars. I feel like media representation plays a big part in this and also the whole death penalty thing. We have a Tangent Tuesday episode coming out about the death penalty where we discuss our personal opinions on the death penalty, but I'm going to give you a little teaser of mine right now. I find it very hard to think that death penalty is the morally right decision when it comes to matters of circumstantial evidence. So for this, I'm surprised he's still on death row and he's not had a new execution date since 2009.
00:41:42
Speaker
Yeah. But given the nature of his crime, I'm not surprised that he was given that penny. I took a look at that document that you sent me, the one they presented to the Supreme Court. And in the beginning of that document, the introduction is David Leonard Wood is a serial killer convicted and sentenced to death
00:41:58
Speaker
for the 1987 murders of six young women whose decomposed bodies were found in the desert area just northeast of El Paso, Texas. The crime remained unsolved for several years until Wood, who was subsequently convicted and sentenced to 50 years imprisonment for sexual assault, bragged to a cellmate that he was the desert killer.
00:42:17
Speaker
So, even within this document, they acknowledge his guilt. And I'm not sure if that's just based on conviction. We really didn't get into the perpetration. We're all about the motivation, perpetration, and investigation of these cases. But we didn't really get into the perpetration, which, given the nature of the case with circumstantial evidence, I completely see why we couldn't, because a lot of that would be not proven. But I believe the only cause of death, I remember, is strangulation. Were they able to determine the
00:42:46
Speaker
from what I saw no they were not able to determine the cause of death for all the victims and the bodies were badly decomposed for some of them but yes they were not able to for all of them I believe one victim Williams I believe she was listed with having been stabbed in the face repeatedly but I don't know that that was determined as the cause
00:43:02
Speaker
I think I also said strangulation and you said asphyxiation. Asphyxiation, yes. Those are different things. There's a strangulation, that's manuals. That's manual strangling by ringing the neck, that's choking. Whereas asphyxiation is just depriving someone of oxygen. And asphyxiation is very hard to prove because with strangulation, there's no bruising.
00:43:26
Speaker
That can be hard to solve. There's a bone in your neck called the hyoid bone. And in cases of strangulation, and in some cases of asphyxiation, that bone can break. And that's how you know that asphyxiation has occurred. But other than that, like asphyxiation, you just pour to smother someone's life. Smothering deaths are hard to determine because then you die just based on deprivation of oxygen to the brain. So with the composition, it sounds like these girls were missing for a couple months and they're in the desert. And it's in that June to September time.
00:43:54
Speaker
I imagine it's pretty hot outside. I just want more information because it's solved but there's not a ton of details out there. I've not heard this case before.
Case Legacy and Reflections
00:44:05
Speaker
I've heard of the desert killer but not in great detail and I think part of the reason is this is a hard case to present.
00:44:12
Speaker
because there's not a ton of information out there. Even just scrolling through, you see a lot of those articles, but you don't get a ton of information, which is odd for you'd think as a man who murdered six people, convicted, and then three suspected, and then per prison testimony brags about 15, you'd think you'd hear about it more, but you really don't. I don't know how to feel. You've stumped me.
00:44:35
Speaker
I'm sorry. Well, I didn't know either because at first I was like, oh yes, he totally did it. But again, it seemed like there was a lot of circumstantial evidence and using the testimonies of the other men. I mean, I do fully believe that this man should be in prison for life because even if he didn't commit those murders, the fact that he has hurt so many people and children, like 13 year olds, he deserves to be behind bars for the rest of his life.
00:45:00
Speaker
this is an interesting case to talk about the death penalty on because you get to talk about circumstantial evidence and then you also can tie in like some people think rapists should be at the death penalty which we'll get into that in the tangent Tuesday episode but that I don't know I just feel kind of sad I don't know I wanted to be angry because he's a you know rapist in a murder it's very sad and it's frustrating like he was convicted and I think that did help bring some closure to the families of the victims although then especially in the case of Desiree Wheatley's mother like she really
00:45:29
Speaker
wanted to see would get the death penalty. It's very sad and I feel like there's still a question mark on it, at least for me. Which is what makes it even sadder with things that don't have solid answers. Clearly the government and the Supreme Court are confident that this was an act by David Leonard Wood. He has murdered six women, but there's no cause of death. They all died around the same time, but who knows if it was even committed by a one man. What if he had an accomplice, which I feel like if he had an accomplice, he probably would have tried to sell them out by now. That's all speculation.
00:45:58
Speaker
And then we see when it comes to not solid evidence, that means there's definitely people out there who believe that he is innocent. But I think when it comes to stuff like, oh, he's either innocent or he's not, you don't usually have rape convictions on the record where it's evident that he is not a good man. At the very least, he's not some poor soul who was waylaid by police. He is a child rapist.
00:46:22
Speaker
And at the very least, he should be in prison for the rest of his natural born days. And he's not just a police scapegoat who's done nothing wrong. This isn't some great tragedy of someone's life stolen from them for crimes they didn't commit. He is a rapist and he was serving 50 years and that conviction
00:46:38
Speaker
Even if it comes out tomorrow that David Leonard Wood did not murder, he's not the desert killer at all, his 50-year sentence still wouldn't be over. So he's lost no time. Him being on death row, that could be considered unjust, unconstitutional, and an undue stress. But his 50-year sentence isn't over. He's not losing any time. But I don't know. This case just seems kind of lacking closure. Really, that's a good way to sum up the case. It's a case that lacks closure.
00:47:05
Speaker
Which is odd. You don't see that a ton for cases that have a solid conviction. But not having causes of death, not having solid evidence that is proven beyond speculation. And it can be without doubt. I don't know. I think this is a difficult case and I think you delivered the information very well. Thank you. We will put links to everything, including that document that was presented to the Supreme Court. We'll put all of that in the show notes. All right, to wrap up from David Leonard Wood, next week, Sierra and I will be doing something
00:47:31
Speaker
a little different. We'll both be covering the same case and actually the media and journalism bias that we kind of touched on today, which as writers, that's been very close to mine in Sierra's parts, is non-biased media. So what we're going to do next week is we're both going to present the same case. I'm going to present it with full facts and Sierra is going to present it with full facts. Nothing we say will be untrue, but the way we present information
00:47:56
Speaker
is going to lead you to believe one person is guilty when I say it and lead you to believe someone else is guilty when Sierra presents the facts. I think that'll be very interesting. I think it will be as well. So I'm really looking forward to that. Stay aware, take care, and we'll see you next week. Goodbye! Goodbye!