A Texas demise row inmate’s final phrases earlier than his execution had been an apology to the sufferer’s household.
Convicted rapist and killer Moises Sandoval Mendoza, 40, was executed by deadly injection Wednesday after spending 5 years on demise row. He was pronounced useless at 6:40 p.m. CT, changing into the third inmate executed in Texas this yr and the 13th in the nation.
Mendoza was sentenced to demise row for the homicide of 20-year-old Rachelle O’Neil Tolleson on March 18, 2004, in Farmersville. Tolleson lived within the small city, about 40 miles northeast of Dallas, along with her 6-month-old daughter, Avery.
This is what we learn about Mendoza’s last moments.
‘I would like you to know I’m honest. I apologize’
Mendoza used his final phrases to apologize to Tolleson’s household, based on the Texas Division of Prison Justice.
“I’m sorry for having robbed you of Rachelle’s life,” he mentioned. “To Avery … I robbed you of a mom. I am sorry for that. I do know nothing that I may ever say or do would ever make up for that. I would like you to know I’m honest. I apologize.”
He additionally addressed members of the family by telling them he loves them and is with them.
“I am properly and at peace. You realize that I am properly and every thing is love.”
Texas Dying Row inmate Moises Mendoza, 40, is about to be executed by deadly injection on Wednesday, April 23, 2025. In 2005, Mendoza was convicted of capital homicide of 20-year-old Rachelle O’Neil Tolleson in Farmersville, Texas.
Mendoza’s case gained a kind of notoriety within the years because the homicide. In 2006, it was featured within the 10th season of “Forensic Files,” and in 2008, the Investigation Discovery collection “Solved” highlighted the case.
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‘I changed into the satan’: Dying row inmate says he had no motive for assaulting, killing younger mom
Within the early hours of March 18, 2004, Rachelle O’Neil Tolleson was at house along with her toddler daughter Avery. Tolleson and Avery lived alone, as Tolleson was in the course of a divorce.
Mendoza informed police he let himself inside Tolleson’s home by means of a again door that evening, per courtroom paperwork. The 2 left to get a pack of cigarettes, leaving child Avery at house.
Mendoza drove a short while earlier than he started to choke Tolleson in his car “for no motive,” he mentioned, based on courtroom paperwork. He then drove the 2 to a discipline close to his home, the place he raped her earlier than choking her once more, courtroom paperwork say.
Mendoza then dragged Tolleson out of his truck and choked her once more till he thought she was useless, Mendoza informed police. To ensure, he “poked her throat” with a knife. Mendoza left her physique within the discipline, the place it remained for a couple of days earlier than he was interviewed by police about Tolleson’s disappearance, courtroom data say.
Mendoza wrapped Tolleson’s physique in a tarp and moved it to his cousin’s land in a extra distant space, only a few miles east of Farmersville. He then dumped the physique in a “dug-out pit” and set it on fireplace to “destroy the fingerprints,” he informed police, The Courier Gazette reports.
A number of days later, a person looking for arrowheads discovered Tolleson’s charred physique, according to The Courier-Gazette.
Mendoza was convicted of homicide and sentenced to demise.
David Leonard Wooden, often known as the “Desert Killer,” who’s incarcerated on the Allan B. Polunksy Unit in Livingston, Texas, is scheduled to be executed on Thursday, March 13, 2025, on the Texas Division of Prison Justice’s Huntsville Unit jail in Huntsville, Texas.
Earlier than his conviction and sentencing, Mendoza wrote to his mother and father, telling them he did not have a motive for what he did. “I do not know what occurred to me at that second. I changed into the satan and after I did one thing that I believed was in a dream,” Mendoza wrote, The Courier-Gazette reports.
On April 2, Mendoza’s attorneys requested for the chance to problem Mendoza’s conviction in federal courtroom.
Sufferer’s child daughter was ‘her life’
On the time of her demise, Tolleson was a brand new mom to her daughter Avery. Tolleson loved actions like scrapbooking and procuring, however her mom Pam O’Neil mentioned it was Avery who was “her oxygen.”
“Avery was her life and I used to be so happy with her when she turned a mommy. Every part simply got here so naturally to her,” O’Neil informed The Courier-Gazette a few yr after Tolleson’s demise. “I hate that Avery gained’t have recollections of her.”
O’Neil mentioned that she and Avery incessantly watched house movies of Tolleson, together with Avery’s first and solely Christmas along with her mom, and appeared by means of scrapbooks that Tolleson and O’Neil made collectively.
“She needed greater than something in life to observe her child take her first steps, say her first phrase, and she or he’ll by no means get to listen to her daughter name her Mommy,” O’Neil mentioned shortly after Tolleson’s demise.
“I don’t suppose we’ll ever heal. I don’t suppose a mom ever actually heals from the loss of a kid,” she told The Courier-Gazette in 2005. “I can’t consider my grandbaby will develop up and not using a mom.”
Pam O’Neil and Tolleson’s father, Mark O’Neil, didn’t instantly reply to USA TODAY’s requests to discuss their late daughter, however Mark has acknowledged Tolleson in a number of public Fb posts through the years.
In 2021, Mark shared a photograph of Tolleson from her wedding ceremony day on Fb.
“Blissful birthday to my stunning daughter in heaven,” he wrote. “I like you and miss you on daily basis, child woman.”
Moises Mendoza ‘one of the violent, sadistic males I’ve ever prosecuted,’ legal professional says
Neighbors described Mendoza as “hard-working” however mentioned he modified as he obtained older, recounting a “violent argument” when he pinned down his mom and sister of their entrance yard as soon as, as beforehand reported by The Courier-Gazette.
Mendoza graduated from highschool, the place he did “pretty properly,” courtroom paperwork state. He obtained a couple of highschool scholarships and accomplished about 9 months of heating and air-conditioning coaching upon graduating.
In 2003, Mendoza was arrested for his involvement in two aggravated robberies on the Dallas School Richland Campus, according to The Courier-Gazette. It was whereas he was out on bail for considered one of these robberies that Tolleson went lacking, the 2006 “Forensic Information” episode explains.
For a lot of their upbringing in north Texas, Mendoza and Tolleson had been really in the identical grade college lessons, Tolleson’s mom, Pam O’Neil, defined in a 2006 “Forensic Files” episode that outlines Mendoza’s case. And the Friday earlier than Tolleson’s homicide, Mendoza had been at Tolleson’s home for a celebration of about 15 individuals, courtroom paperwork say.
Scientific psychologist Mark Vigen described Mendoza throughout his trial as “immature” and “psychologically under-developed,” claiming that Mendoza loved getting away with “being sneaky” and obtained offended when others criticized him, as acknowledged in courtroom paperwork.
Throughout Mendoza’s sentencing, former Collin County First Assistant District Legal professional Greg Davis described Mendoza as “one of the violent, sadistic males” he’d ever prosecuted.
— USA TODAY’s Greta Cross contributed to this report.
This text initially appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Moises Mendoza executed Wednesday: Texas death row inmate’s last words
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