Texas Teen Found Guilty of Murdering 15-Y-O Girl and Gouging Her Eyes Out; Prolaims Murder Was Satanic Ritual Allowing His Friend to Sell His Soul to the Devil
A Houston teen, who claims to have sold his soul to the devil, was found guilty of capital murder by a jury on Thursday afternoon for what has been deemed a satanic killing, rape and mutilation of a 15-year-old girl.
After the jury deliberated for over an hour, 18-year-old Jose Reyes was given a life sentence without the option of parole but was spared from the death penalty because of the fact that he was only 17 when he killed his friend and classmate, Corriann Cervante, this past February.
Reyes proclaimed that the murder occurred as part of a ritual that allowed his friend, Victor Alias, who's also facing murder charges, to sell his soul to the devil. Reyes alleges that he had previously sold his soul to the devil prior to that night. Alias, who is 16 years old, will stand on trial at a later date.
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Harris County prosecutors say that after a long night of drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana at a mutual friend's apartment, Reyes and Alias invited Cervantes to join them for a night of casual and consensual sex at a nearby abandoned apartment.
Once the two teens got Cervantes inside the apartment, prosecutors claim that they bashed her upside the head with a porcelain toilet tank lid, and then carved an upside-down crucifix on her stomach. When Reyes tried to escape, Reyes is said to have hit her in the head with an ash tray and then Alias strangled her with a belt.
Reyes and Alias proceeded to stab her in the face and chest with a screwdriver. As Cervantes pleaded for her life and bit her attackers' hands attempting to get them to stop the assault, they gouged her eyes out of her head with a plastic rod.
"Whether or not the devil was involved, what happened in that apartment was sadistic and inhumane." Harris County Assistant District Attorney John Jordan told jurors. "[Reyes] says he has no regrets."
Reyes' attorney Bob Loper admitted that his client definitely had some level of responsibility for the death.
"This was a horrible murder of a young girl and we're not going to shy away from that," Loper told the jurors. "You've got to ferret out for yourselves exactly what happened and who is responsible for which parts."
Jordan told reporters that although Cervantes had consented to join the two in the apartment, once the girl attempted to run away and the two teens prevented her from doing so, it became a kidnapping as well.
"They discussed the fact that Reyes had sold his soul to the devil, and if they ended up killing this teenager that would also allow the 16-year-old to sell his soul to the devil," Jordan said. "The teenager screamed, 'Why are you doing this to me?' During that time, they stopped her. It became a kidnapping and, ultimately, she was killed."
Local TV station KHOU reports that Reyes' ex-girlfriend, Agapita Gonzales, told the jurors that she overheard Reyes describing to his sister, who also testified in court, how he tortured and killed Cervantes. Gonzales said upon hearing of Reyes' heinous crime, she immediately started fearing for her own life.
The news station also reports that pictures from the crime scene were shown in court and many of the jurors began to cry upon seeing the photos.
"The only thing that we're looking for is justice for her. It's been really difficult," said Catherine Cervantes, Corriann's grandmother. "We not only have to go through this trial, but we have another trial also, with the other person. So it'll be hard for the family."
