Tom Green County Native Maintains Innocence Ahead of Execution

HUNTSVILLE, TX — Tom Green County native David Leonard Wood, known as the “Desert Killer,” continues to maintain his innocence just days before his scheduled execution for the 1987 murders of six young women in El Paso.

“I’m accused of killing six people when an entire police force couldn’t find a single shred of evidence of anything,” Wood said in an interview with USA Today at the Allan B. Polunsky Unit prison in Livingston. “How can I not be angry at the corruption that put me here? How can you let people just dump cases on you and not be angry?”

Wood, 67, is set to be executed by lethal injection after 5 p.m. on Thursday, March 13, at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s Huntsville Unit. He was convicted on Nov. 10, 1992, for the killing of 23-year-old Ivy Susanna Williams. Under Texas’ serial-killing provision, the deaths of five additional women were included in his conviction. He was sentenced to death on Nov. 30, 1992.

The bodies of Williams, Desiree Wheatley, 15; Rosa Maria Casio, 24; Karen Baker, 20; Angelica Frausto, 17; and Dawn Marie Smith, 14, were found in shallow graves in northeast El Paso. Three other victims — Marjorie Knox, 14; Cheryl Vasquez-Dismukes, 19; and Melissa Alaniz, 12 — were never found.

All of the victims were reportedly last seen with Wood or had connections to him.

Wood has consistently denied involvement in the murders, arguing that there is no physical evidence directly linking him to the crimes.

“I will make these people kill me before these people ever make me say something like that," Wood said.

His attorney, Gregory W. Wiercioch, has filed appeals seeking to halt the execution, citing DNA evidence and witness testimony that he claims could exonerate Wood. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and the state attorney general’s office have denied requests for additional DNA testing.

Wood, who was born in San Angelo, moved to El Paso as a child and dropped out of Parkland High School in ninth grade. He later found work as an auto mechanic. He was originally scheduled to be executed on Aug. 20, 2009, but was granted a last-minute stay over claims that he was mentally impaired. That appeal was later denied.

His defense team continues to push for a stay, arguing that a male DNA profile was found on a sundress belonging to one of the victims and that Wood was excluded as the donor. Prosecutors, however, maintain that Wood was responsible for the murders, and multiple courts have upheld his conviction.