The fact that Ms. Lucio is on death row at all is an outlier. It is rare for prosecutors to seek the death penalty in a case in which a mother is accused of murdering her children, her attorneys said.
State Rep. Jeff Leach with Ms. Lucio during a visit to lawmakers at a prison unit in Gatesville, Texas.Credit…Texas State Rep. Jeff Leach, via Associated Press
One issue her attorneys are addressing is the statute – unique to Texas – that requires prosecutors to prove a person’s “future dangerousness” in order to obtain a death sentence. Ms. Lucio had no history of violent crime prior to Mariah’s death, so prosecutors relied heavily on disciplinary records from her time behind bars following her arrest. Ms Lucio’s lawyers have argued that prosecutors misrepresented those records and that she did not commit material wrongdoing.
Mrs. Lucio, who lived in the border town of Harlingen, struggled to provide for her large family. At the time of Mariah’s death, she was pregnant with twins and already had 12 children.
According to her attorneys, she worked part-time as a home nurse but struggled with her drug addiction and often relied on soup kitchens for sustenance. Once the family was homeless and lived in a park. Child Protection Services took her children away from her for a time for neglect, but her lawyers said Ms Lucio had no documented history of abusing her children.
At the time of Mariah’s death in 2007, Mrs. Lucio was living with Mariah’s father, Robert Alvarez, and nine children; The family had just moved into a new apartment. Police questioned both Mr. Alvarez and Ms. Lucio, but their lawyers said they approached Mr. Alvarez very differently, treating him as a witness rather than a suspect. He was eventually found guilty on a much lesser charge of injuring Mariah by omission – by failure to seek medical attention for her – and sentenced to four years in prison.
When they were questioned immediately after Mariah’s death, police accused Ms Lucio of beating her daughter to death. Prosecutors cited bruises on Mariah’s body and an untreated broken arm as evidence of abuse.
But from the start, Ms Lucio has maintained her innocence, saying her daughter fell down a flight of stairs as the family were moving out of an apartment two days earlier. Her lawyers have produced expert testimony that the bruises may have been caused by her falling down the stairs and that broken arms are not uncommon in young children who are prone to falls. Mariah had a medical history of falls, including in daycare, and no record of previous bruising, attorneys said.