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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 15, 1998)
The Battalion TATE Monday * June 1S,| Execution Continued from Page 2 While in custody, he began telling Conway and Texas Rangers about killing people. Eleven days after his arrest, his murder count had reached 77 as he sat down for the first time with Jim Boutwell, the sheriff of Williamson County, just north of Austin. Lucas' tally doubled to 156 in his conversations with Boutwell, including one where he told of picking up a fe male hitchhiker in Oklahoma, having sex with her in an off-road area, strangling her, having sex with her corpse, then dragging the body from the car and dumping it into a ditch along interstate 35 near Georgetown. Boutwell, part of a task force investigating a series of unexplained body dumpings along the Central Texas interstate, had an open murder case: an uniden tified woman found in a ditch along the highway on Halloween 1979. As Herman Conway, a Montague County constable whose father died in 1994 and had worked on the orig inal Lucas arrest for nine months, tells the story: "They asked him if she had any clothes on. He told them she had on a pair of socks. They said, 'What color?' He said: 'Orange.'" With his attorney objecting to his statements and a video camera rolling, Lucas directed officers to the spot where he said he left the body of the woman who became known as "Orange Socks." The glare of publicity surrounding the self-proclaimed serial killer, whose murder count had passed 360, forced his trial to be moved from Georgetown to San Angelo, 200 miles to the northwest, where a jury decided he should be put to death. It's their decision that's set to be carried out June 30. It's all wrong, Lucas said, who contends he was in Jack sonville, Fla., at the time Orange Socks died, working as a roofer. "You get to like someone as well as Sheriff Boutwell, he was like a father, and he used me," Lucas said. "No doubt about that." What's wrong, according to Lucas, is that like all the other murders he confessed to, he was coached by law en forcement officers. Instead of leading police to the scenes of the killings, they led him and he agreed, he said. "One thing about it, he was sharp," Herman Con way recalls. "They try to say he was crazy. He wasn't crazy. He knew to hide everything. My dad, he didn't feel like he did do all the murders, but did feel he did a bunch of them." As Lucas explains it, he was just being a good citizen. And once he started talking, he wouldn't shut up. "I don't try to do anything to anybody that would be wrong," he said. "I've tried to help anybody that comes along. I'd do it for free. I've always tried to be polite to everybody. I've tried to do what 1 could to help thejn ” Help, maybe. Hoax, probably, according to a year-long investigation by the Texas attorney general's office in 1986 that found a "notable lack of physical evidence" to sup port his confessions. That backed the findings of others who discovered Lucas' claims and facts of some of mur ders didn't add up. The 600-plus cases d windled, but Lucas still has at least 10 murder convictions, nine of them in Texas. He plead ed guilty to eight crimes and two juries found him guilty. His sentences include one death penalty, five life terms, one life without parole and 210 years in prison. The 1986 state investigation determined there was no attempt by law enforcement to deliberately participate in a deception to solve murder cases. That's not how Lucas sees it, illustrating the opposites that make much of what he says open to question. "I set out to break and corrupt any law enforcement of ficer I could get," Lucas said. "I think I did a pretty good job. I feel I've accomplished what I set out to accomplish. "I'm not proud of it. There are 600 killers walking around out there. That's how many cases they took off the books. It's not a good thing. And that I'm sorry for." Although the attorney general's investigation of the Orange Socks slaying cast doubts on the likelihood of Lu cas' involvement, Ed Walsh, the former district attorney in Williamson County who won the murder conviction and death sentence, stands by the case built by him and Boutwell, who died a few years ago. "I am convinced," Walsh said when asked about Lu cas' guilt. He also said he had complete confidence in Boutwell, who insisted Lucas disclosed aspects of the murder only the killer would know. "There were allegations that the sheriff fed him infor mation," Walsh said. "But, you know, you have to have a gut feeling about people that you know and know well and I'm convinced Sheriff Boutwell wouldn't have done that. "He had a great reputation. He was not the sort of stereotype small town sheriff that you sometimes hear or read about. He was a real sharp person, a professional guy." And so far, all the appeals courts that have reviewed the Orange Socks case agree and have upheld his convic tion, leaving Lucas' attorneys with a final appeal to the Supreme Court and a hope that Gov. George W. Bush could intervene by commuting his sentence to life. "She says she doesn't know what the Supreme Court is going to do, but I shouldn't hold my hopes up for it," Lucas said of a conversation with his lawyer last month. "She said our best hope is with George Bush. When she said that, I lost all hope." Mother and child killed in arsonist's geti ( HOUSTON (AP) — A drunk man set fire to a bar that had re fused him service, then sped away with his headlights off and killed a woman and baby in a head-on collision, police say. Officers said Melanie Nino, 28, and Thomas Nino, 7 months, were killed and four other family members were injured about 1 A.M. Saturday when a car driven by Arthur Thomas Callahan Jr., 28, struck their station wagon. Callahan was charged with two counts of intoxication manslaughter and was being held in the Harris County Jail in lieu of $100,000 bond. "Most head-on collisions are severe and the least sur- vivable. This is just a senseless tragedy," Harris County Sher iff's It. John Denholm said. It started at a tavern called Kei th's Place, Denholm said, where Callahan was refused service be cause he appeared to be drunk. The bar is on FM 2100 in an un incorporated area about 30 miles northeast of downtown Houston. "He told them that if they did n't serve him he would burn their place down," Denholm said. Callahan left and returned about two hours later, went to his car and returned with a gasoline can. "He set the fire near the air conditioner and then got in his car and took off," Denholm said. Driving with his headlights off, Callahan turned onto the highway just as Charles Nino Sr. and his family were driving by, Denholm said. Nino was just a few blocks from home after picking his wife up from work. Callahan crossed into the southbound lanes and slammed head-on into the family's station wagon, Denholm said. The mother and infant were taken to Hermann Hos pital by helicopter and died shortly after their arrival. Also taken to Hermann were Charles Nino Sr., 42, and sons Charles Jr., 7, Reggie, 5, and Jacob Sowell, 9. The man and the 5-year-old were upgraded from stable condition Sunc* tal spokesperson Leef J Charles Jr. was in stas tion and Jacob hadL ed and released, iA? Callahan, who.. jured, had a blood 2:1 el that exceeded tli-L gal limit by "quiteij may face motif charges, Denholm:;: "Because he was w scene of an arson wejJ see if we can possiblyd murder charges," Denfil Texas law allowsij ital murder charge slaying is committee junction with anothe: Callahan, who wc for DWI in NewMecKI had no reaction whe ^mf vestigators that he..^, charged in the death i au i er and child, DenhriJ Bar owner Keith®! said the fire damage ^1 ited to the airconditi the immediate areas tl Wet T-shirts lower protection from radial^ SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Wet T-shirts provide less protection from the sun than dry ones do, two physics professors reveal. "We had all heard stories about T-shirts not giving much protection when they're wet," Pro fessor Fred Loxsom of Trinity University said. "It was pure curiosity that drove us to it." Using a spectroradiometer to measure radia tion at different wavelengths, Loxsom and part ner Richard Bartels tested the the protective power of dry T-shirts versus wet ones against the sun's harmful ultraviolet rays. They converted their results to sun protection factors, better known as the "SPF" found on bot tles of sunscreen. The duo found that a dry white 100-percent- cotton T-shirt has an SPF of about 15, meaning that its wearer could spend 15 times as long in the sun without burning. Wet, the same shirt had a sun protection factor of 5. Much of the light that hits a dry white T-shirt bounces off the cloth's fibers back ink mosphere instead of going directlytof But when the same shirt is wet, mores; ation passes through. "Instead of having particles witfu tween so light will scatter off of the parte reduce the effect of the particlesbyfi air gaps with unprotected skin/Toraa Polyester shirts worked better thancoc a shirt that was 65 percent polyesteranc cent cotton had an SPF of 19 dry and W The professors also found that a I) muslin shirt offered more protectionrM natural cloth. A dark shirt is better than a light one, Loxsom said, becauseili more light. »ibi "I wouldn't rely totally on aT-shiit!^^' sunscreen also," Loxsom said. The experiments were performedoo| of Trinity's Marrs-McLean science I miles away from any beach. mimmNQ «*w//r Bellydance Sect A • Mon • June 15, 22, 29, July 6, 13 • 6:30-8:30 p.m. Sect B • Wed • July 8, 15, 22, 29, Aug 5 • 6:30-8:30 p.m. $38 for students/$43 for non students You won’t believe you waited so long to try it. Call 845-1631 today for info! A CALI FIRST A WAIT LESS To make an appointment at A. P. Beutel Health Center: S Call our Appointment Line at 845-6111, on Monday-Friday, 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. ® After hours, call Dial-A-Nurse at 845-2822. Services are available to all students who have paid the Student Health Fee. A. P. Beutel Health Center Hours 8 a.m. — 5 p.m. Monday-Friday Student Health Services A.P. Beutel Health Center Division of Student Affairs Texas A&M University www.tamu.edu/shs Appointments 845-6111 Appointment Cancellations 845-1018 Dial-A-Nurse 845-2822 EMS/Ambulance Service 9-911 Fax 845-8913 Information 845-1511 Administration 845-1518 Health Education 845-1341 Insurance 845-0183 Pharmacy 845-2382 Prescription Refills 862-4511 Preventive Medicine 845-1549 Accredited by Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care, Inc. AAMC estimates that 6 results of the April 1998 MCALi, ^... ——■—-i . mailed to test takers on Thursday, June 18th. The Princeton Review is dedicated to helpinQ every pre-med student get an MCAT score he or she is satisfied with. 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