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Death row inmate who raped and murdered 15-year-old posts shocking statement from behind bars
A prisoner who has spent almost 30 years on death row in Texas for the gang rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl has spoken out from behind bars for the first time.
Carlos Trevino, 51, used an online penpal service to complain about the reaction to his heinous crime and people around him not being able to “let it go”.
The death row inmate has been posting about his experience online
On a website called Wire of Hope, which was set up to connect incarcerated individuals with penpals outside of the prison system, Trevino asked: “Are you the black sheep of the family? Have you ever felt as if you just don’t fit in?
"Have you ever made an error or mistake and people just don’t let it go?”
In an effort to reassure other criminals, he posted: “No matter how hard you try to make things right, even if these errors or mistakes have made you a better person, they weaponise your past while you’re trying to escape it.
"People, even family, look at you and judge you for that one action, and you are only known for that one action.
"They don’t see anything different about you or the changes you have made. They just see the mistakes you made.”
Referring to his own experience of sexually assaulting and stabbing a teenager to death in San Antonio on June 9, 1996, Trevino said: “Regardless if it has been years, you’re always judged for that one thing.
"It doesn’t matter if you have apologised, made changes in your life, or how much remorse you’ve shown.
"Even when regret is written across your heart and face, people just don’t see the real you. Welcome to my world."
Trevino's execution has been rescheduled multiple times
Three decades after Police found the body of Linda Salinas a day after she got into a car with Trevino, who drove her to a park where she suffered a harrowing assault by a group of men, the perpetrator has still not been executed.
He was set to die in 2020, but the death warrant was withdrawn because of the “current Covid-19 conditions in Texas”.
That was the third time that his death was rescheduled because his longstanding legal team argued that evidence that he had fetal alcohol syndrome and was both physically and emotionally abused by his mother was overlooked during his original trial.
In the years since he was first sentenced to death, over 10,000 people have signed a petition to prevent Trevino from being executed with a statement reading: "His trial attorney did not investigate potentially mitigating evidence that he suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome, due to his mother drinking while she was pregnant."
While the rapist murderer’s future remains uncertain, he is trying to seek a romantic connection with a woman through Wire of Hope.