Victor Saldano was sentenced to death by the State of Texas for the murder of Paul King
According to court documents Victor Saldano and an accomplice would kidnap Paul King from a grocery store parking lot. King was driven to a remote location where he was robbed and murdered
Victor Saldano would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Victor Saldano Photos
Victor Saldano Now
SID Number: 05543981
TDCJ Number: 00999203
Name: SALDANO,VICTOR
Race: H
Gender: M
Age: 51
Maximum Sentence Date: DEATH ROW
Current Facility: POLUNSKY
Victor Saldano Case
A federal appeals court has agreed to review the case of an Argentine man who is on death row for the 1995 killing of a man abducted from a Collin County supermarket.
The decision comes more than two decades after Victor Hugo Saldano, now 45, was convicted of capital murder and sentenced in 1996 to die for kidnapping Paul Ray King from a Sack ‘n Save in Plano.
Saldano and a friend forced King into their car at gunpoint, drove to Lavon Lake and shot him five times.
Saldano, a day laborer from Argentina, was 24 years old and in the U.S. illegally when he killed King. His accomplice, Jorge Chavez, is serving a life sentence.
The case drew attention from his homeland and Pope Francis, who started corresponding with Saldano’s mother, Lidia Guerrero, in 2013and has met with her at least twice. The Catholic Church does not support capital punishment.
Argentine journalists covering the six-day trial told The Dallas Morning News in 1996 that Saldano was the first person sentenced to death from Argentina since it won independence from Spain in 1809.
A judge later threw out the sentence because Walter Quijano, a clinical psychologist, improperly testified at trial that Saldano’s Hispanic background made him likely to be a future danger. Saldano was again sentenced in 2004 to die.
The appeals court wrote that there was “ample evidence” to support Saldano’s incompetency in its decision to consider the case. The court pointed to examples of Saldano refusing to wear nonprison clothes, masturbating in the courtroom, laughing during testimony and rocking in his chair.
“Saldano’s broken and sometimes incoherent speech suggests that he may not have been able to communicate effectively,” the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals wrote.
The court also granted the decision on the grounds of ineffective counsel. Both the trial judge and Saldano’s lawyers had concerns about his mental state, but defense attorneys never requested a competency hearing, the 5th Circuit wrote.
