(October 12, 2008)—A convicted Central Texas killer is among 12 death row inmates whose executions are scheduled over the next six weeks.
Denard Manns was sentenced to death in 2002 in Bell County for the 1998 murder of Army Spc. Michelle Robson, who was sexually assaulted and shot in the head and chest.
Prosecutors said Manns took credit cards and cash from the victim’s residence in Killeen and fled in her car.
He was arrested after the murder on an unrelated weapons charge, but was charged in the killing after forensic tests linked the firearm to the murder.
He’s scheduled to receive a lethal injection on Nov. 13.
Two executions are scheduled for next week, two for the week after and two more the week after that.
Six more inmates, including Manns, are set to die in November.
“It's just the way of Texas,” said inmate Alvin Kelly, who’s the first of the 12 set to die when he heads to the state death chamber in Huntsville on Tuesday.
Kelly, unlike some of his fellow prisoners, says he looks forward to dying, but insists evidence in his case was manipulated and that he's innocent of shooting of 22-month-old Devin Morgan to death in East Texas in 1984.
The toddler's parents, Jerry and Brenda Morgan, were gunned down at the same time.