Filipino Immigrant Executed in Nevada

CARSON CITY, Nev.—Rejecting the Philippine government’s last-minute plea for clemency, Nevada authorities on Monday executed a Filipino citizen convicted of killing two U-Haul employees with a hammer and crowbar during a 1994 robbery.

Hours after consuming a last meal of steak, rice, corn, apple pie and Sprite, Alvaro Calambro, 25, was led to the death chamber at 8:44 p.m. He was nervous but under control and resolute, according to Glen Whorton, chief of classifications and a spokesman for the prison.

His last words, according to Prisons Director Bob Bayer, were “I regret it.” At 9:06 p.m., he was pronounced dead.

Philippine officials had argued that the execution would violate the Vienna Convention treaty because they weren’t immediately notified of Calambro’s arrest in 1994, thus leaving him with inadequate legal representation. But Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa said the U.S. Supreme Court has made clear that a foreign citizen imprisoned in the United States must raise alleged treaty violations in a timely manner, and added that this did not happen in Calambro’s case.
Last week, public defender Michael Pescetta had petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of Lydia Calambro, the condemned man’s mother, because Calambro himself had said he wanted no appeals. Pescetta maintained that Calambro was nearly mentally retarded and thus was especially vulnerable to being influenced by his brother-in-law, Vietnam-born Duc Cong Huynh, with whom he killed Peggy Crawford, 38, and Keith Christopher, 21.

The slayings took place during a $2,400 robbery at the U-Haul business from which Huynh had just been fired, according to court documents. During the attacks, the documents said, Calambro beat Christopher on the head with a hammer and tried to pry open his skull after he died, and he also may have tried repeatedly to drive the crowbar through Crawford’s head before succeeding. Both victims had been gagged, and their wrists were bound to their ankles.

Lydia Calambro said her son, born in Iloilo, Philippines, had been abused by his father and had run away from home, but had otherwise stayed out of trouble until he met Huynh, a native of Saigon. Huynh also received a death sentence but hanged himself at Ely State Prison. His wife, Calambro’s sister Maria, killed their 4-year-old son after the slayings and is now in a Nevada prison.

Despite testimony about Calambro’s mental state, the Nevada Supreme Court, U.S. District Court in Reno and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco have agreed Calambro is competent in waiving appeal rights, and on Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear his mother’s appeal.

Nonetheless, Nancy Hart, a coordinator for the Reno, Nev., branch of Amnesty International, said Calambro’s reported IQ of 71 and his psychological problems should have warranted clemency.

“Mr. Calambro is borderline retarded and suffers from serious mental illness,” she said the day before the execution. “Although his condition does not excuse his crimes, it certainly justifies sparing his life.”

Neither Calambro’s mother, Lydia, nor his siblings were present for the execution. Calambro had last spoken to his mother Friday, according to Whorton.

Along with 11 journalists, five family members of the victims were present when Calambro died. They stated that while the execution could not bring full closure to their grief, it did provide a sense of relief, Whorton said.

Keith Christopher’s brother, George, said before the execution that Calambro knew “right from wrong, and IQ doesn’t have anything to do with the act he committed.”

Eight men have been executed in Nevada since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977. One woman and 83 men remain on Nevada’s death row.