Clemency and Death
Lucas's supposed confidant, Ottis Toole, died on September 15, 1996, from cirrhosis of the liver. He was serving six life sentences in a Florida prison. In 1998, the Texas Board of Pardon and Parole voted to commute Lucas's death sentence to life imprisonment, in accordance with Governor George W. Bush's request. It remains one of only two successful commutations of a death sentence in Texas since the restoration of the death penalty after Gregg v. Georgia in 1976, the other being Kenneth Foster in 2007 who was controversially convicted under Texas' law of parties statute. On March 13, 2001, Lucas died in prison from heart failure at age 64.
Read more about this topic: Henry Lee Lucas
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