SAN ANTONIO, Texas
Ramirez, Kristie Mayhugh, 40, and Cassandra Rivera, 38, along with Anna Vasquez, 38, were found guilty of molesting two girls in alleged assaults in 1994 that an expert has described as reminiscent of the Satanic ritual day care abuse cases of the 1980s and early 1990s. The women, known nationally as the “San Antonio 4,” always maintained their innocence. On Monday, after the district attorney agreed the group was entitled to a new trial on the grounds that recent scientific advances undermined testimony pivotal to their convictions, Ramirez, Mayhugh and Rivera were released on bond. Vasquez was paroled last year.
“I couldn’t sleep last night. I couldn’t believe I was here,” said Rivera, a mother of two who met her granddaughter for the first time Monday night. Rivera said she found herself staring at her 20-something son and daughter, who were just 9 and 8 years old when she first went to prison nearly 14 years ago. “I can’t believe they’re with me,” she said.
John Brecher / NBC News
That finding was debunked on Monday, when the Bexar County Criminal District Attorney’s office and Ware said that scientific advances undermined the doctor’s testimony, leading to the three women’s release from prison. The women now await a decision by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on whether to grant them a new trial. If that happens, the district attorney will decline to prosecute them, and their convictions would be overturned, said Rico Valdez, the chief assistant criminal attorney who oversees the office’s post-conviction review.
The new scientific information was allowed to be presented under a “junk science” law passed in Texas earlier this year that gives defendants the chance to submit findings that may cast doubt on their conviction.
The agreement between the attorneys was a huge breakthrough for the women, who had felt they were railroaded at trial, partly because they are lesbians.
Cassandra Rivera hugs her son Michael on Nov. 19, his 22nd birthday and her first full day out of prison in nearly 14 years. “I made it in time for your birthday,” she told him Monday just after her release.
Vasquez and Rivera, who entered prison three years after Ramirez, said a woman in their initial unit wanted to jump them until she heard their side of the story: they told her they were falsely accused.
The group ended up doing the same with other inmates, but some still called them child molesters, Rivera said. “I still walked with my head held high because I knew I was innocent. We were innocent,” she said. “We know what happened, and the truth is going to eventually come out.”
The women, except for Ramirez, could have avoided prison. Plea deals were offered, but they refused to accept them on the grounds that they were innocent. They could have left prison earlier, too, if they agreed to participate in a sex offender treatment program, which they all rejected.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/11/19/21540535-san-antonio-4-speak-out-after-prison-release-were-actually-innocent?lite&ocid=msnhp&pos=1
