My sister Rita,
she was my best friend.
Rita would ask me when it was time to go to bed,
and we would share a room together.
Uh, she would say, "Would you like me to sing you to sleep
or play you the flute?"
Rita was the number one flute player at the Georgetown High School.
She was in the drill team.
Rita and Kevin were just starting to date.
They were going to the Highland Mall in Austin, Texas
to go see the movie Midnight Express.
On the way home,
the car ran out of gas on I-35.
My father told us later that he had seen Rita and Kevin walking,
but didn't know it was his daughter.
The next morning, she hadn't come home.
So that's when the family started to panic.
And then, Tuesday morning,
my mother was beside herself.
She was cleaning out a closet to stay busy,
when suddenly,
my sister... my older sister heard on the radio
that they had found a body in McLennan County.
And my sister screamed and told my mother,
"That's Rita! They found Rita!"
And my mother said to my older sister,
"No, it's not.
It's not my daughter. That is not Rita."
Law enforcement called us to the courthouse.
They took us down to the basement...
and they showed us...
Rita's clothes.
That's when they told us that Rita had been killed.
Kevin had been shot in Georgetown
and had six bullets in his head.
Rita's body was found in Waco.
She had run across a field,
and they came and shot her execution-style,
right behind the head.
Rita was killed when I was 16.
It affects everything I do, every day I live, every day I breathe.
I miss her.
No matter who it was,
I just wanted justice.
Where's the murder?
He's looking for, uh, where one of the killings was done.
He's trying to show him
- where the killing was done. - Another murder.
Uh, he's, uh, directed us to the, uh, scene of another murder.
Uh, this is a boy, uh...
that was with a girl that we picked up the other side of Georgetown.
They had car trouble and we stopped and picked them up.
The boy had gotten out of the car,
and, uh...
was a little ways out in front of the car when, uh, Ottis shot him.
The girl, she was trying to get out and we kept her in.
We went on to, uh...
on up the road, uh...
Oh, it's about, uh...
Oh, let's see. It'd be about 55 miles from here...
...is where we shot the girl at.
Was the girl carrying anything?
Well, yeah, she had, uh...
a... a sweater,
Uh, I think that was in her arms, and I think, uh...
I think a billfold or a purse, one of them, I don't remember which.
Uh, she had...
She had the sweater, I know, in her arms.
So, uh, y-you have some, uh, information
uh, from that body found here.
- Yes. - Does it match to the history?
Uh, he's...
As far as I'm concerned, he has confirmed both cases.
The girl...
The girl was killed, uh, 56 miles from here
instead of 55.
She was carrying a sweater
in her arms when she was shot.
Hmm.
It was a relief to know that...
they had found Rita's killer.
I wanted him to...
to go to prison and...
and sit on death row forever.
Maybe not die immediately, but just sit there and think about it.
Henry Lee Lucas admits to confessing to over 600 murders,
including the one that sent him to death row.
So why did you confess to all those cases?
Just one of them things, I guess.
If Lucas dies by lethal injection in December,
he may take the answers to some 100 untried cases along with him.
One of the most vicious killers in American history
is set to be put to death in a couple of weeks,
but like Ted Bundy before him,
Lucas is now desperately trying to save his own life.
I just want people to know that I'm not the mass murderer.
If my appeal is denied,
I won't stand a chance of staying alive.
This is Texas.
And whatever happens in Texas,
no matter what it is,
they gonna have their way.
My last visit to death row,
he was saying, "I think they are gonna execute me in a couple of days."
And I said, "You know,
when you open yourself to the Lord
to help you,
He will."
Unless George Bush does something or...
or the parole board does something...
Well, they've never given clemency here in the state of Texas yet, I don't think,
so I don't think that they will now.
We're a death penalty state.
Uh, we've executed a lot of people.
Governor Bush, in over 100 other cases,
had refused to give any leniency.
They were gonna put him to death for the Orange Socks killing.
And I knew,
and I thought everybody knew by that time, that he hadn't done it.
Henry Lee Lucas was given the death penalty
for the 1979 rape and murder
of an unidentified woman,
known only as Orange Socks.
The only evidence connecting Lucas to the killing was his confession.
But Lucas says that confession was only a lie,
and because of that, his life should be spared.
All I did was lie.
What about the murderers out there that's running in the street right now?
I was a lawyer for Henry Lee Lucas
on the Orange Socks case.
It seems incredible now. I...
I don't know that I really...
could see how crazy this case was at that time.
As soon as Jim Boutwell heard about Henry Lee Lucas,
he was convinced that he had the man
who not only had killed the Orange Socks victim,
but also all the other cases up and down the interstates.
Jim Boutwell had a mystique and aura around him
that established him as untouchable.
Always had a stetson, white shirt,
boots, belt with the seal of Texas on it.
So, when he started down the path of Henry Lee Lucas,
uh...
most everybody went along with him.
His word was the word,
and we all looked up to him, we all respected him.
That was up there.
There's no doubt in my mind that Henry Lee Lucas murdered that girl.
Why?
Uh, because of some things he told me in the initial interview,
that only the killer could have known.
He had not seen photographs, he had not seen the reports,
or anything prior to the time of the interview.
Do you want to tell us, uh, just what happened?
Boutwell interviewed Henry after I interviewed him.
He told me that he didn't do it.
So, you know, I-I...
I just never felt comfortable with that being one of his cases.
Is this the girl...
That's the same girl.
...that you picked up?
- That's the same one. - Okay.
So I go jump on Henry again.
I said, "Now, dang it, you lying to me? You lying to him? What's the deal?"
He said, "Ah, he just wanted to clear it,
uh...
so I took it for him."
Something happened in that jail between Jim Boutwell and Henry Lee Lucas.
Some relationship formed there...
that was such that Henry would do whatever it was
that the sheriff wanted him to do.
Do you like him?
Well, I don't like what he's done,
and he knows that.
Uh, I see him on a daily basis and have for over a year now.
Uh...
We get along.
We get along by not lying to each other and being truthful with each other.
So his track record is real good?
Real good or real bad, depending on how you want to look at it.
- But he is telling the truth? - Yes.
Sheriff Boutwell was known as the person
who had the serial killer
that everyone in the country was talking about,
and his ego and reputation were wrapped up in that.
In Sheriff Boutwell's office,
there was a plaque on his wall,
and it said,
"To Sheriff Jim Boutwell,
graduate of the Henry Lee Lucas School of Psychology."
Sheriff Boutwell had Lucas' psychology down.
He was the only one that could deal with Lucas when Lucas...
got real angry and disturbed.
Boutwell was the one that we'd always call on to...
you know, come and fix Henry.
I took Henry in to see Sheriff Boutwell
in January of 1984, because Henry...
told me that he couldn't make any more confessions
and that he couldn't say no to the sheriff.
Anyway, Henry, uh...
Henry's told me again that he wants to quit talking...
- Mm-hmm. - Feels like he can't say no.
Well, Henry, I appreciate what you've done.
But I'm not doing it honest.
I just don't have no control of myself.
Well, you need to just relax.
Like you've been told...
many times before, you have a right not to talk,
and I think, of course,
I think you've got a right to talk too if you want to.
I feel that some of these things that I'm accepting ain't mine.
Uh, it seems like everything I do is wrong.
Well...
I mean, it might not look like it to you, but...
I know that I'm accepting things that do not fit.
I just can't stop it.
Mmm.
Well, maybe you just got it in you and it wants out.
Once you get it all out, why,
maybe you'll be very much more peaceful with yourself.
Why don't you, uh...
Why don't you watch the television for a while?
And if your nerves are bothering you,
if you feel like you need any more medication, or need to change it,
why, all you got to do is let us know
and we'll see a doctor and see what we can do.
You have a guy who's on the...
brink of a nervous breakdown.
And you have a sheriff who has...
just come in and once again manipulated him
in a way...
to satisfy what the sheriff was wanting to do.
I wish I could have seen it at the time of...
of what was going on with the sheriff and with Lucas.
It was clearly the result of their relationship and... and this...
the...
um...
a very, very sick man
that was being manipulated by the sheriff.
That's fine.
Jim Boutwell was utterly convinced,
without any doubt,
that Henry was guilty for those crimes.
It was Sheriff Boutwell's responsibility, he believed,
to persuade Henry to keep going,
because the facts were there and he was determined to get them.
Boutwell believed Henry to a certain extent,
I'm sure,
but he also wanted to clear his cases.
Sheriff is an elected position.
Every four years, Sheriff Boutwell had to run for re-election.
He was a very popular sheriff.
He was very conscious of the voters
and I-I think he wanted to clear up a lot of cases
so that no one could say that there were a bunch of unsolved murders
that had happened on... on his watch.
Sheriff Boutwell had five cases in Williamson County
that Henry Lee Lucas made confessions for.
Rita Salazar was from Georgetown, the family was from Georgetown,
and that's where Boutwell was the sheriff.
You know, he wanted to close this case and be a hero to that family.
I did see the sheriff, Jim Boutwell, come around quite often
to talk to my mother.
We believed everything he said.
He was the sheriff.
Was the girl carrying anything?
Well, yeah, she had, uh... a... a sweater,
Uh, I think that was in her arms, and I think, uh...
I think a billfold or a purse, one of them, I don't remember which.
It was easy to lead Henry to a result.
Why did you leave the... the orange socks on the body?
I left it on a lot of 'em. Uh, I really don't know why.
I think you had a perfect storm come together
of a con man who will say anything
coupled with an aggressive sheriff
who was wanting to bolster his reputation.
Looking back on it now,
it's obvious to me that Jim Boutwell had a lot riding on Henry Lee Lucas.
Time is 4:20 p.m.
The location is the Williamson County Sheriff's office in Georgetown.
Sheriff Boutwell would take Henry's inconsistencies or mistakes
as just part of the management process of his key suspect.
Where did you pick up, uh, that couple?
In Shreveport, Louisiana.
Shreveport, Louisiana?
The couple we're looking at weren't picked up in Louisiana, Henry.
They were picked up, uh, in this area.
I realize it's possible you... you might...
be somewhat confused over things,
but you...
you look again...
at the boy's picture.
In all of Boutwell's cases,
Henry had facts that only the killer would know,
like the case of Carolyn Cervenka.
There was a missing girl in Williamson County
that was creating some problems for Sheriff Boutwell.
You told us earlier today...
that you abducted
a young girl.
Boutwell had gotten him to confess to the murder
of the missing Cervenka girl.
I, uh, stripped her down and had sex with her again
after I killed her.
Henry had confessed, just like on all the others,
and gave graphic detail
about everything about Carolyn.
Earlier you told us, Henry, about her jewelry.
Yeah, I recall, it was a gold type necklace
with, uh, some kind of a little design thing on the front.
And Henry had described her necklace.
I know that I know details about it,
such as her necklace,
parts of the car and stuff like that, but, uh...
I can't explain right now, uh, why I know them details.
They finally found her months and months later.
She had drowned, she'd had an epileptic fit.
Drove her car into the water and drowned.
Nobody murdered Carolyn Cervenka.
And when they pulled Carolyn up out of the creek,
she was still wearing that necklace.
Henry had never seen Carolyn Cervenka.
He had never seen that necklace,
yet he described it to a T.
How'd that happen?
Henry, I'm going to give you these rights once again.
I think Jim Boutwell was utterly convinced...
You have the right to remain silent...
...that this was accomplishing what he had set out to do,
that there was no question that it was being handled properly.
Sheriff Boutwell was probably one of the most professional officers
I've been around.
He demanded his officers be credible that worked for him,
and I certainly think he was credible.
If there were some errors made there,
I wish he was here to explain
what caused him to cause these cases to be cleared.
But...
he didn't have a chance to because he passed away years... years ago.
I got all my information from Sheriff Boutwell.
Of course, he's not here to prove it now. You know, he's gone, so...
That sheriff, he went crazy.
You know, he wanted everything he could get, so I gave it to him.
So you think the sheriff and the Rangers are the ones who...
- Are they to blame? - I don't know that the Rangers...
I don't know whether the Rangers are to blame,
or whether the sheriff is to blame,
or whether I'm to blame, you know? I don't know.
What do you think's gonna happen in the next couple of weeks?
I either get to stay, or I die. One or the other.
- You know, that's the way it is. - Okay.
In the '90s,
after I won the verdict against Channel 8,
I became Henry's defense lawyer.
In spite of there being no physical evidence,
no witnesses, nothing to tie Henry to these crimes,
except what came out of his own mouth,
which was fed to him, that he just regurgitated back out,
Henry will probably be put to death for something he didn't do.
Every case that I could prove he was innocent
cast more doubt on Orange Socks,
and maybe slow down that ticking clock toward his execution.
Henry killed his mother.
That's undisputed.
I had my doubts about the Becky Powell murder.
I still didn't think he had committed it.
Becky had been Henry's traveling companion,
one of his first victims,
but Henry kept telling me Becky was alive.
He said they had stopped at a truck stop
and when he came out,
he saw Becky climbing up into an 18-wheeler.
She left with a truck driver,
and she never came back.
Henry had gotten some letters from somebody claiming to be Becky.
They were coming from Missouri.
So the detective that I hired,
he and I went to Missouri.
We followed her in her station wagon.
We staked out the house where we thought she lived.
Okay, it's recording now.
I'm gonna ask you, please,
what was your name in 1979?
Rita Lorraine Powell.
Okay. Was that Becky Powell?
That's Becky Powell.
How'd you get the name "Becky"?
It's just a nickname. Everybody started calling me Becky.
All right.
Did you know Henry Lucas?
Yes, I did.
How did you meet Henry Lucas?
Ottis brought him home.
And who is Ottis?
Ottis is my uncle.
Where is the first place, Becky, that you remember living?
I remember living on 1st Street
in Jacksonville.
Okay.
She could describe the house that Becky grew up in.
Uh, she described the last time that she ever saw Henry.
I ran off with a trucker.
Okay.
Left Henry.
And then this lady introduced us to her husband.
Tell us, uh, briefly,
uh, how you met your wife.
Well, I was coming from Wichita Falls,
going to Fort Worth, Texas,
and I stopped at a truck stop in Bowie, Texas.
All right. You say you were coming, but were you driving a vehicle?
Yeah, my truck.
And, uh, what kind of truck?
Peterbilt, red, silver.
So I...
stopped at this truck stop and I saw this young girl out in front.
And, uh, she seemed...
uh...
troubled.
Uh, scared.
Is this kind of what she looked like when you picked her up at the truck stop?
Yes, sir.
Maybe a little bit older?
I thought, "This is it.
This is the smoking gun."
I flew her to Austin.
I hired a polygraph operator, a good one.
Becky, why did you leave Henry?
Because I was tired of being broke and hungry.
Did he ever exhibit to you any behavior
that would make you think he was a mass killer?
No.
And he came out smiling.
He said, "Vic, you have found Becky."
I felt so good.
As soon as we got the polygraph report, I went public with it.
I wanted to get it out there because Henry was facing the death penalty, see?
Henry Lee Lucas told investigators he murdered Becky Powell here.
Everyone believed him.
Until now.
We were there, but he did not cut me up...
and throw me... throw my body parts everywhere.
Meet Becky Powell.
I was shocked to find out I was dead.
She also claims she was with Lucas
the night the unidentified woman only known as "Orange Socks" was murdered.
Enough, attorneys believe, to overturn Lucas' death sentence.
He was trick-or-treating with me and my brother Frank
in Jacksonville, Florida,
at the time that Orange Socks was killed.
Give me odds that this is Becky Powell.
Oh, a hundred percent.
And when the, uh, DNA comes in,
then that'll confirm it's a hundred percent.
I'm very confident,
but it's easy to be confident when you're holding a royal flush.
This is Becky.
Investigative reporter Hugh Aynesworth
is an authority on the Lucas case.
He, too, says the woman is Becky Powell.
She knows specifics about family,
about housing units,
about streets, about neighbors,
about happenings, dates, things of that sort.
I spent a good bit of time with her and I'm convinced.
Then I might add, why would you want to be Becky Powell?
I got a call from Vic Feazell saying that, uh...
he had found Becky.
He wanted DNA run
to prove that Becky was still alive.
And, of course,
you know, I'm sitting there and I'm-I'm-I'm knowing in my own mind
that Henry confessed to killing her,
confessed to how he killed her,
pointed to the ground where we'd dig up part of her.
You know, that's just...
You don't write that many coincidences off.
So we need to put this fire out as fast as possible.
So I told him, I said, "Well, let's put her under oath and...
uh, make sure that she's telling the truth."
When he said that, it kind of ran up a red flag.
Like, "Hmm, under oath."
That means he might be wanting to get her for perjury.
So, uh...
I had a real come-to-Jesus meeting with her.
We sat and talked.
In the meantime, I asked my wife to go and look through her luggage.
And my wife called me into the house about an hour later.
She said, "Oh, my God, I found a stack of letters like this
between her and Henry Lucas."
And Henry was describing for her
what the house looked like,
what Becky's house looked like, what, uh...
you know, how they met, all the trips, all that kind of stuff.
I mean, I just... I dropped.
I dropped.
I th... I think I felt worse that day than the day I got arrested.
Well, I'm a liar and a fraud.
I asked Henry, I said, "Well, what if I said I was Becky Powell?"
At first, he said it would never work,
and I said, "Why not?"
And, um, he said, "Well, were you ever fingerprinted?"
And I said, "No."
I am in love with Henry.
I'd do anything in the world for Henry.
That's all I wanted to do,
was to get Henry out of prison.
I guess I got my mind to feeling like I was...
her, because I wanted to pull this off so bad.
One of the reasons why I wanted to write to him
is because of his track record,
because he killed so many people.
How did you come to meet the woman who said that she was Becky Powell?
Well, she comes down, and when I first saw her, I said,
"What... What you... What you want?" You know?
I said, "Are you Frieda?"
She said, "Yeah."
- Did you believe she was? - Yeah.
Do you still?
It was just my first visit with him, and he just...
I just fell in love with him, and...
he was the nicest, kindest man I ever met, really.
Henry was feeding me all this information through his letters,
but in various parts of the letters so they wouldn't catch on.
Do you believe that Becky is out there?
No. I believe she's dead.
I think Henry killed her.
Your attorney is very fearful that you were part of this lie.
Well, I'm not.
She claims that she also visited John Wayne Gacy
and also Charles Manson.
I can't say that, because I don't know.
Charles Manson...
I told him, I said,
"I think it's about time you get out of prison."
He said, "I don't wanna get out of prison."
He said, "You people are crazy."
I'd been fighting this battle,
and I wanted it so bad, I believed it.
I felt it would give me back my reputation,
and all it did was hurt it.
I was angry at Phyllis.
I was angry at Henry.
I was angry at myself.
And that's when I quit representing Henry.
He wrote me some pretty sad letters after that,
but, by then, I had just had enough.
This scam blowing up in your face, do you think this has hurt your chances...
I don't know whether it's a scam or not. You people are telling me that.
Are you mad because it means you're that much closer to execution?
No, it does not.
I don't give a damn if I was executed tomorrow,
you understand that?
Then why are you so upset?
Why? Because of all the damn lies that's going on.
That's why.
Henry was accustomed to undergoing psychological tests.
He was incarcerated as a teenager.
There were psychological reports from then until the end of his life.
Among them was a test for confabulation.
Confabulation is a type of memory impairment.
In other words, a person has gaps in the memory,
and those gaps are automatically filled in with invented information.
In this test, he was off the scale.
Henry would take facts,
and then he would add fantasy,
and then he would add what he thought the person he was addressing
needed or wanted,
and that would create a new truth.
And that truth would shift from moment to moment.
How many people, really, did you kill?
It'll be...
When it's finished, I look for it to be over 360.
It'll be way over 500.
My mother, back in 1960.
That is the only murder I've ever committed.
And I'm not positive I even committed that.
Are you a, uh...
- pathological liar, you think? - Yeah.
- I am. - Are you telling me the truth now?
Yes, I'm telling you the truth, because I can prove it, you know?
- Why should I believe that? - I don't expect you to.
I expect you to find out the truth.
- You know... - He never thought long-term.
I think that was part of his mental illness, actually.
He was very focused on surviving moment to moment,
and whatever was needed, he was gonna give it,
without thinking about any kind of consequences
for anyone, himself or anyone else.
Henry Lucas did not know what the truth was.
Texas Governor George W. Bush
is pondering the fate of multiple murderer Henry Lee Lucas,
scheduled for execution next Tuesday.
There are some questions as to whether not Henry Lee Lucas,
uh, committed the particular crime that he was accused of.
There's no question he committed some of the other crimes.
I was interviewing Governor Bush at the time,
and I said, "George, by the way...
you're... you're gonna put a guy to death Saturday
that is innocent."
I had occasion to run into Governor Bush at a function.
I said, "There is now a death sentence on your desk.
It involves a client of mine,
that I firmly believe in that client's innocence.
It's Henry Lee Lucas."
I heard on TV that...
it's looking like this... this could possibly happen.
He could get off of death row.
He confessed to killing my mother.
I have read things in his confession
that sounded like my mother, the way he described my mother.
I was convinced.
In my heart, I feel that Henry Lee Lucas did kill my sister.
Lucas was convicted of her death.
I believe that he was an animal,
obtaining his 15 minutes of fame,
glorifying himself.
I had to see this man executed.
Well, of course we wanted Lucas to die!
Yes, we wanted him dead.
Henry Lee Lucas murdered my sister, Laura Jean Donez.
Henry Lee Lucas murdered my mother, Joan Gilmore.
Henry Lee Lucas killed my sister, Rita Salazar.
I organized the group
so we could fight against people who were saying Lucas was innocent.
Whether he...
killed that woman or not, what about these other...
What about my mother? What about all our other family?
You know, what about all these other victims?
He can't get off death row. He can't.
The first question I ask in every case
is whether or not there is any doubt,
any doubt,
about an individual's guilt or innocence.
This is the first case I...
since I have been the governor where the answer to that question
is yes, there's doubt.
Henry Lee Lucas is unquestionably guilty
of other despicable crimes
for which he has been sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison.
However,
I believe that there is enough doubt
about this particular crime
that the state of Texas should not impose its ultimate penalty
by executing him.
Okay, you take care, Henry.
Lucas's attorney Rita Radostitz
was the first to notify Lucas.
He didn't have anything to say.
- He was very emotional. Um... - Was he crying?
He said he wasn't, but as I said, you can never believe anything Henry says.
I think there are people who will see this tonight who will say, um,
they're not sure whether you're crying for those families or for yourself.
Well, God knows.
I wasn't happy.
I was livid.
Rosanna Fuentes was going to see Lucas executed.
He was convicted of murdering her younger sister back in 1983.
I voted for him.
I won't do it again.
These victims' relatives say they want to meet with the governor.
They want to see cases reopened
in which Lucas was never tried
in hopes of getting another death sentence.
Mr. Bush, what if it was your loved one,
your mother,
your daughter that got killed?
I started faxing
newspapers all over the US
that Governor Bush was siding with a serial killer.
Governor Bush was running for president,
and he didn't want the bad publicity.
His attorneys called me and said,
"What do you want?"
I asked the governor to test for DNA.
There was DNA on her underclothes,
from the rape.
We wanted to prove that he was guilty.
We wanted him to stay on death row.
We wanted him executed.
All right.
I remember getting the call that Henry was dead.
I was actually invited to his funeral.
But I wasn't gonna get up on a cold day and drive down there
and watch somebody who'd lied to me like he did,
uh, get buried.
He died of natural causes.
So, what he...
died knowing, died with him.
There were only a few people at Henry's funeral.
The preacher and Clemmie.
I read a letter that Henry wanted me to read,
asking the people to forgive him for lying.
Then we sang "Amazing Grace."
Pretty soon, it was like millions of singers overhead,
millions of angels singing.
The most beautiful voices I have ever heard in my life.
How many people did Lucas kill?
At least three, maybe more.
What about the hundreds of confessions?
If Lucas didn't kill all of those people, who did?
The truth about Lucas may never be known.
I was a detective
for the Williamson County Sheriff's Office.
DNA was just becoming a popular investigative technique.
I was asked to investigate three different cases,
all three of which Sheriff Boutwell closed
with Henry Lee Lucas' confessions.
Well, he's, uh...
directed us to the, uh, scene of another murder.
We went on up the road, uh...
About 55 miles from here,
is where we shot the girl at.
He knew exactly, within one mile,
how far the...
Rita's body was dumped.
There's no way he would have known any of that...
if he was not told by somebody,
because, as we know now, he had nothing to do with the murder.
The point that the sheriff stopped being a hero for... for me...
is when we found out that, um...
the two strands of DNA didn't match Henry Lucas.
Then I knew, at that point, that everything was a lie.
As far as I'm concerned, he has confirmed both cases.
Thank you.
Sheriff Boutwell was feeding Henry Lee Lucas the information,
and closed cases, and lied to people about who killed their loved ones.
We were lied to for 20 years.
We believed Henry did it for 20 years.
And then we found out who the real killer was.