Meeting David Wood — And One of His Victims

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Episode 4 of “The Last 12 Weeks,” a podcast from The Marshall Project, Serial Productions and The New York Times, features two very different takes on David Wood.

The goal is to answer a set of questions about the man whom the State of Texas plans to execute: Who is he, and what exactly is he capable of?

The last time anyone took up those questions seriously was more than three decades ago at his capital murder trial, where prosecutors argued that Wood had gone from being a convicted rapist to being a serial killer who might kill again. And yet, Wood and his lawyers insist that isn’t true.

We head to death row to hear him tell us why. But not before we talk to somebody with a very different feeling about the kind of person Wood is: one of the rape victims who testified against him.

David Wood believes he became the lead suspect for the murders of women and girls in El Paso in 1987 because of mutual animosity between him and the detectives. The detectives denied this theory. He had been to prison for sexually assaulting victims of a similar profile to the murder victims. Paul Ratje for The New York Times

Wood, who is 68 and was sent to death row in 1993, has become one of the longest-serving death row prisoners in Texas history. Lexi Parra for The New York Times

Christi, 13, was raped by Wood in Veterans Park in El Paso in 1980. Paul Ratje for The New York Times