The long -standing criminal case against an armed man of Texas who killed 23 people in a racist attack aimed at Hispanic buyers in a Walmart in the passage in 2019 is about to reach an end.
Patrick Crusius, 26, is expected to declare himself guilty on Monday to capital murder and receive a life sentence no possibility of probation for the massacre near the border between the United States and Mexico.
El Paso County District Prosecutor James Montoya, said last month that he was offering Crusius a guilt and that would face the death penalty by state charge.
Crussius has already been sentenced to 90 consecutive perpetual chains in a federal court after declaring himself guilty in 2023 of hating charges for crimes and weapons.
According to the Biden administration, federal prosecutors also take out the death penalty out of the table.
Crusius is expected to meet his time in a state prison. Crussius Initiax was arrested by local authorities and will enter the custody of the Texas Criminal Justice Department if it is sentenced by state positions, said a spokesman for the Federal Prison Office.
This is what you should know about the mortal attack on August 3, 2019 and its consequences:
The attack
Crussus was 21 when the authorities say he drove for more than 10 hours from his home in the Dallas suburbs in El Paso and opened fire to the Walmart, which is popular among the buyers of Mexico and the United States.
Prosecutors have said that Crusius wore earmuffs that silenced the sound of shooting when he began to shoot people in the parking lot.
Then he moved inside the store and continued to shoot an AK -style rifle, Corning Shoppers in a bank near the entrance where nine were killed before shooting in the payment area and people in corridors.
When leaving Walmart, he shot a car that passed, killing an old man and hurting his wife.
Crussus was arrested shortly after and confessed to the officers who arrested him at an intersection, according to the police.
Pointing to Hispanic buyers
In a publication on an online message board, just before Massre, Crusius, a white and university abandonment, he said that the shooting was “in response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”
He said that Hispanics would take care of the government and the economy.
In social networks, he appeared consumed by the nation’s immigration debate, tweeting #Buildthewall and publications praising the hard -line border policies of Republican President Donald Trump, who was in his first mandate at that time.
After the shooting, Crusius told the officers that he had signed up for Mexicans.
Joe Spencer, one of Crusius’s lawyers, described Crusius on Thursday as “an individual with a broken brain.” Spencer said that Crusius has been diagnosed with schizoofective disorder, which can be marked by hallucinations, delusions and humor changes.
The victims
The people who were killed were age to be at a 15 -year -old high school athlete to the grandparents.
They included immigrants and Mexican citizens who had crossed the United States border on routine shopping trips.
They included Jordan Anchondo and Andre Anchoe, who were killed while bought with their 2 -month -old son, Paul, who survived.
The authorities have said that Jordan Anchovant protected the baby from the shooting while her husband protected them both.
Guillermo “Memo” García and his wife Jessica Coca García were raising funds for her daughter’s football team in the parking lot when both were shot. She suffered leg injuries but recovered.
He died from his wounds almost nine months after the shooting, raising the death toll at 23.
A week after the shooting, Coca García got up from his wheelchair to give a speech on the other side of the road from the county prison, where Crussius was being a hero.
“Racism is something that I always wanted to think that it did not exist,” he said. “Obviously, he does.”
A long -term judicial case
Montoya said he decided to sacrifice the guilt agreement because most of the victims’ relationships were anxious because the case was resolved. He acknowledged that not all families agreed.
Montoya, a Democrat, said he supports the death penalty and believes that Crusius deserves it, but the case may not have gone to trial until 2028 if his office had continued to review the death penalty.
When Montoya assumed the position in January, he became the district fourth fourth to supervise the case in almost six years.
One of his predecessors resigned in 2022 under pressure on his management.
He said that pandemic also caused delays.
Stephanie Meléndez, whose father, David Johnson, died protecting his wife and granddaughter, said he initially wanted Crusius to get the death penalty, but when the case lasted, she wanted her to end.
“I just wanted it to be,” Meléndez said. “I had finished reviving everything. I finished going to court for hours. I ended with the information sessions that happened after the hours would last and it was the same talk again and again. We were ready for everything to travel, perfecting again, honestly, honestly, honestly, honestly, honestly, honestly, honestly, again.