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Texas is ready to execute Travis James Mullis on Tuesday, a Brazoria County man who sexually assaulted, strangled and stomped on his toddler son’s head till he died in 2008.
Mullis, 38, was convicted and sentenced to demise in 2011 for killing his 3-month-old son Alijah on the Galveston Seawall. Mullis fled Texas, then turned himself in to legislation enforcement and confessed to the crime a number of days later.
His ultimate attraction was denied by the Fifth Circuit Court docket of Appeals in 2023. As of Tuesday morning, Mullis had not submitted any new last-ditch state or federal appeals, nor had he filed an attraction to the U.S. Supreme Court docket.
That leaves Mullis on observe to develop into the fourth particular person executed by the state of Texas this 12 months. Two extra executions within the Lone Star State are scheduled for 2024.
On January 28, 2008, Mullis drove from Brazoria County to Galveston along with his son Alijah within the again seat after making an attempt to sexually assault a good friend’s 8-year-old daughter, in accordance with court docket paperwork.
Within the early morning the subsequent day, Mullis sexually assaulted his son. Unable to cease Alijah’s crying after the assault, Mullis proceeded to strangle his son, then stomped on his head a number of instances and crushed his cranium. He then tossed his son’s physique into the comb and fled to Philadelphia.
Just a few days later, Mullis turned himself in to the police and confessed to the crime.
At trial, Mullis’ attorneys targeted on his historical past of psychological sickness stemming from a troublesome, abusive childhood. His father deserted his household shortly after his delivery, which was marred by a life-threatening sickness with a mortality fee as excessive as 50% in newborns.
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Mullis’ mom died when he was 10 months previous. By not less than the age of three, his adoptive father started sexually assaulting him. He spent years out and in of psychological well being therapy for quite a lot of psychological circumstances, together with suicidal ideation.
The prosecution targeted on Mullis’ historical past of violence and argued that the menace he posed couldn’t be mitigated by therapy or incarceration. And Mullis’ written and videotaped confession of killing his son, in accordance with court docket paperwork, “provided nearly indefensible grounds for conviction.”
Within the years since his conviction, Mullis modified his thoughts repeatedly on whether or not to attraction his demise sentence in state and federal courts. He deserted all appeals inside two months of his conviction after a court-appointed physician discovered him competent to take action.
“I have always admitted guilt + justice is deserved for the victims families,” Mullis wrote in a Sept. 13, 2012, letter to the court docket waiving his appeals. “It is in the best interests of justice for the victim + the victims families for this appeal to stop here and execution of this sentence to be carried out in a timely manner.”
However over the course of the subsequent decade, Mullis reinstated and revoked his appeals a number of extra instances, saying he had lied throughout his competency analysis and was motivated to surrender his appeals by psychological sickness, suicidal ideas and “an irrational fear” of spending the remainder of his life in jail.
The Texas Court docket of Legal Appeals affirmed his conviction in 2012. Mullis filed an attraction in federal court docket in July 2013, arguing that he had had poor illustration at trial and alleging that the state had offered “false evidence of extraneous offenses” he had dedicated in his youth. The federal district court docket dismissed his petition in 2021, and the Fifth Circuit Court docket of Appeals affirmed that call final 12 months.
“Mullis is a disturbed individual whose mental illness has permeated his life,” the federal district court docket in Galveston wrote in denying his attraction. “As concerns about Mullis’ mental health have come up at each stage, state counsel and various courts have acted with competence and zeal to assure that Mullis has enjoyed all the process he is due.”
“However uncomfortable it may be,” the court docket added, “this case is left where Mullis himself has chosen it to be.”
