Mother Says She Beheaded Children

A woman pleaded guilty to murder Thursday in the decapitation slayings of her three children, after reaching an agreement with prosecutors that spares her from the death penalty.

Angela Camacho, 25, will receive three concurrent life sentences and will be eligible for parole in 40 years.

Had she been convicted and sentenced to death, she would have become the first female Mexican national on Texas’ death row. Her attorneys had failed to prove she was mentally retarded and, therefore, ineligible for the death penalty; the plea deal spares her anyway.

Dist. Atty. Armando Villalobos said the plea deal was better than a costly fight for a death sentence that might later be commuted to life. He estimated a trial and appeals would have cost $6 million.

Camacho and 24-year-old John Allen Rubio, her common-law husband, were accused of strangling and decapitating 3-year-old Julissa Quezada, 1-year-old John Esthefan Rubio and 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio in March 2003.

A relative called police, who found the girls stuffed in a trash bag and the boy on a bed. The couple told police they thought the children were possessed.

Rubio was convicted in 2003 and sentenced to death after he requested the death penalty. Rubio has since decided to fight the sentence.