Execution Of Convicted Serial Killer David Leonard Wood Approaches

ABC-7 will revisit one of the most gripping episodes in El Paso history in the days leading up to the execution of convicted serial killer David Leonard Wood, which is scheduled for Thursday in Huntsville, Texas.

In the summer of 1987, several girls and young women disappeared in Northeast El Paso. Six of them were found just months later, buried in shallow graves in the Northeast El Paso desert. Wood, convicted and sentenced to death by lethal injection in 1992, became known as El Paso’s Desert Killer.

Wood has adamantly maintained his innocence for two decades.

Reporter Darren Hunt and photojournalist Miguel Mendez will travel to Huntsville to be there as the victims’ families seek closure. Darren Hunt will attend the execution as a witness Thursday.

Wood’s execution will also be the subject of ABC-7 Xtra at 10:35 p.m. On Sunday. John Guerrero, a former El Paso Police Department homicide detective who investigated the case, and Joe Spencer, a defense attorney who opposes the death penalty, will be the guests.

Click here to view video from the ABC-7 archives of Wood’s trial in 1992 and a 1998 interview with Wood by former ABC-7 anchor Gary Warner.