HUNTSVILLE, Texas – On Tuesday, the State of Texas carried out the execution of Garcia Glen White, 61, at the Huntsville prison unit.
White was sentenced to death for the 1989 murders of twin 16-year old girls. However, White was connected to, and confessed to a total of five murders.
“I apologize and I am sorry for all the pain I have caused,” White said during his final statement and before singing the hymn ‘I Trust in God.’
Court records read White’s first victim was Greta Williams in 1989. White said he hit Williams several times during an argument over money and then rolled her up in a carpet. In December of 1989, White stabbed Bonita Edwards to death during an argument and then killed her twin daughters, Annette and Bernette, when they came out of their rooms to see what happened to their mother.
The murders remained unsolved until 1995. White was arrested and accused of beating Hai Pham to death during a robbery of his convenience store. Pham had moved to the United States with his wife and five children nine months before the murder. White eventually confessed to all the murders.
“Glen, how come this is 1995, this all happened back in November of 1989. How come you never, how come you never came forward and told anybody this?” a Houston Police detective asked White during his 1995 confession.
“I don’t know,” White answered.
“(Did) those girls deserve to die?” the detective asked.
“No sir, they didn’t,” White said.
“Then how come you didn’t come forward sooner and tell us about what happened?” the detective asked.
“I was scared man, I was scared, OK, I was scared,” White answered.
Five members of Williams’ family and two members of Pham’s family witnessed White’s execution but declined to make a public statement. Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg spoke on their behalf.
“The victims and their families are never made whole by the executions, but at least the legal process finally comes to a conclusion,” Ogg said. “The suffering that the surviving family members have gone through is just unspeakable. They’ve waited through appeal, after appeal, after appeal.”
White claimed diminished mental capacity and “cocaine psychosis” should have precluded him from receiving the death penalty. Ogg said White was educated and “he knew what he was doing.”
“There wasn’t any question about his guilt, it’s not a circumstantial case. It is brutal stabbing deaths, beating deaths; things that caused these victims a great deal of pain in their last moments of life, “ said Ogg.
Ogg said White’s attorney also asked to meet with her to plead for his client, claiming he was a redeemed man.
“He explained that Garcia White had done some good while on death row; spreading the word of God to other condemned inmates,” said Ogg. “I took that into consideration, but it just could not outweigh the butchered families and their surviving family members who still wanted the death penalty served on him.”
After the execution, Ogg also said court records show White was initially considered the prime suspect in Williams’ murder at the time she was killed because he lived next door, but a lack of evidence led to him being “no-billed” by a grand jury.