FEDERAL EXECUTION PUT BROWNSVILLE ON THE MAP

By Juan Montoya

BROWNSVILLE - This border city has gained fame (and infamy) for many things: the occasional hurricane, the spate of anencephaly deaths of some 40 infants, a subtropical climate, its proximity to the Gulf of Mexico, etc.
Historically, this place was the site of the first two battles that ignited the Mexican-American War, the place where Billy Mitchell started using planes as instruments of war, and where the spies for the German Imperial High command crossed the Rio Grande with the Zimmerman Note to entice Mexican government officials to join them against the United States.
It was also here that Dr. William Gorgas devised the hygienic methods to thwart yellow fever and made construction of the Panama Canal possible, and where Lucky Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart initiated air mail service to Latin America.
Speaking of flying mythology, it is also where Howard Hughes’ doctors listed on his death certificate as the place and where he allegedly breathed his last while he flew overhead.
But on June 19, 2002, Brownsville was again put on the map after one of its residents, Juan Raul Garza, a former migrant student at Josephine Castaneda School, was executed by lethal injection eight days after convicted white supremacist Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh received the same punishment.
Garza, convicted in federal court for three murders, died by lethal injection in the U.S. prison in Terre Haute, Ind., after his plea for clemency was rejected by President G.W. Bush. His was only the second federal execution after a 38 years hiatus.
When Garza was growing up, most people in town knew just about everyone or had heard about most other people. People close to the migrant stream remember Juan and his siblings.
“I remember going to school with Juan and his sister Irene,” said one. “In those days, all the migrant students from throughout the city were bused to the same school. We attended classes from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. to make up for the time we missed when we left in May and returned in October. It was segregated education.”
The school itself was circled with an eight-foot, chain-link fence topped with three strands of barbed wire. Students could only enter and exit through one gate under the watchful eye of Ruben Gallegos, the principal.
Juan was shy as an adolescent and teenager, and was short for his age. It was until much later that his activities brought him in contact with the law and the federal government. But when he lined up with the other migrant students for his free milk and baloney sandwich, he was just like anyone else - a working- class child who labored with his family in the fields of northern states. For them, childhood meant getting up at the break of dawn and laboring their children’s bodies like adults until it was too dark to see the plants anymore.
Some migrants went overcame their humble beginnings and went on to become economists, Federal Reserve directors, teachers, attorneys, accountants, etc. The Rosenbaums, Rochas, Pedrozas, Gallegos, etc., are names well known for their achievements. One, Rene Rosenbaum, an economics professor at Michigan State University, wondered whether Juan might have turned out different if he hadn’t fallen through the cracks.
“He was no different than any of us,” he said. “We came from poor working families struggling to survive working in the fields. Many families could not afford to their children to school because they depended on the income earned by the entire family to carry them through the lean times in winter when they returned to Texas. There was very little choice for many of them.”
With little economic alternative left for many along the border, criminal activity has always been .a lure. And so it was for Juan. Over time, he become one of the most successful marihuana smugglers, sending loads all over the country.
His activities soon caught the attention of federal anti-drug agents. Using a disaffected relative who was in his organization, they infiltrated his group and soon flipped enough of his co-defendants to pin several murders on him - including four in Mexico that were never proved. A federal jury sentenced him to death.
Garza’s attorneys asked for clemency citing Death Row statistics that at the time showed that of 20 federal inmates, 17, or 85 percent, were minorities (14 black, 3 Hispanics, and three white); that between 1995 and 2000, 80 percent of all federal cases submitted for capital punishment involved minority defendants.
Further, statistics showed that cases tried in the southern states of Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Georgia made up for 65 percent of federal death penalty prosecutions.
In fact, between 1995-2000, 42 percent of all federal death penalty cases came from five of the 94 federal districts.
Their pleas fell on deaf ears and the execution date set. His sister Irene - now deceased - would raffle the clocks Juan made from varnished plywood and toothpicks to send him money for his personal expenses. He refused to attend his execution.
Witnesses said Garza showed little emotion at the time of his death and asked forgiveness for the pain and grief he had caused. He sighed once, and then it was over.