Hearing set on killer’s competency

Thursday, June 11, 1998 | 11:10 a.m.

RENO -- A hearing was scheduled for 2 p.m. today in U.S. District Court on the petition by Lydia Calambro that her son is mentally incompetent and should not be put to death by lethal injection.

Alvaro Calambro, 25, is scheduled to be executed Saturday night at the Nevada State Prison for the brutal 1994 murder of two Reno residents.

Appeal documents have also been filed in the Nevada Supreme Court, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court by Assistant Federal Public Defender Michael Pescetta.

At a hearing Wednesday, a state district judge ruled that the mother did not have standing to file the petition in behalf of her son. Judge Steve Elliott said Calambro is the only one who can bring an appeal to save his life.

Calambro sat through the hearing without showing any emotion. He gazed down at the table in front of him or straight ahead and never looked at his mother. And he did not confer with Pescetta, who declined to say whether he talked in private with Calambro.

Calambro, who sports a pony tail and a goatee, wore prison denims and white tennis shoes. His arms and feet were chained and there were three state prison guards and two deputy sheriffs standing behind him.

When the judge made his ruling, he never showed any emotion. And when he was led out of the courtroom, he never glanced at his mother who was in the front row.

The mother, who has a limited command of English, did not talk to reporters after the hearing. But state Deputy Public Defender Tim O'Toole, who escorted the mother, said, "She wants her son to live."

Clarence Crawford, whose daughter was killed by Calambro, said he had no sympathy for the murderer. "He knew what he was doing," said Crawford who with his wife Betty, daughter Carol and son-in law, sat in a back row during the hearing.

All four have places as witnesses at the execution scheduled for 9 p.m. at the Nevada State Prison in Carson City. Crawford said he doesn't understand why these court appeals continue. "Something's wrong with our judicial system. This should be cut and dried. The defendant is not appealing."

Calambro and Duc Huynh pleaded guilty to killing Peggy Crawford, 37, and Keith Christopher, 21, during a $2,400 robbery at a U-Haul business in Reno in January 1994. Christopher was beaten to death with a hammer and Crawford had a crow bar stuck through her head. Both victims had been tied and gagged.

After leaving the U-Haul shop, the two went on a crime spree that included robbing a gun store, kidnapping a Sacramento, Calif., man and robbing him of $180 in Kern County. The pair were also involved in a high-speed chase in which Calambro fired at least 30 rounds at pursuing officers, according to court records.

They crashed their stolen car in Los Angeles and fled into the Hall of Records after exchanging gunfire with police. A female security guard was taken hostage and the two demanded $500,000 and an armored truck. They surrendered after a 9 1/2 hour standoff.

The men were convicted in California of multiple crimes and sentenced to life in prison plus 29 years.

In Nevada, the two men originally resisted appeals but then consented. Huynh committed suicide in prison in December 1995. And Calambro has not talked to his family or his lawyers since July 1996.

Before he went silent, however, he told one of his lawyers, "If you were human, you would shoot me."

The petitions filed by the mother says her son doesn't understand what is happening and should not be put to death.

Deputy Attorney General Terry McCarthy argued there is nothing in the law to permit the mother to bring an appeal in behalf of her son. The law, he said allows only the convicted person to file a petition for a writ of habeas corpus.

But Pescetta said the Nevada Constitution gives the judge the authority to consider petitions filed in behalf of any person held in custody. He said the Constitution takes precedent over the law.

If the appeals fail, Calambro will be the first person executed in Nevada since 1996. There are 88 inmates on death row in various stages of court appeals.