HOUSTON, May 18 -- A jury Thursday convicted railway killer Angel Maturino Resendiz of capital murder in the 1998 rape and beating death of Dr. Claudia Benton in her suburban Houston home.
The jury rejected defense arguments that the 40-year-old Mexican drifter should be found not guilty by reason of insanity. The jurors took the case Wednesday and deliberated about 11 hours.
The punishment phase of the trial will begin immediately. Prosecutors will ask for the death penalty, but he could also receive a life sentence.
Maturino Resendiz has admitted killing nine people in Texas, Illinois and Kentucky from 1997 to 1999 as he rode freight trains across the United States on frequent trips from Mexico.
During seven days of testimony, psychiatrists offered differing opinions on the defendant's mental state. Prosecution experts said he was cold and calculating, while defense witnesses said he was insane.
During the trial, FBI profiler Alan Brantley said Maturino Resendiz was "clearly an organized sexual serial killer" and not psychotic.
A defense witness, Dr. Richard Lawrence Pollack, testified that Maturino Resendiz scored highly on IQ tests with an overall 120, but suffered from a brain disfunction.
Pollock diagnosed Maturino Resendiz as a paranoid schizophrenic. He said the suspect often quoted Bible passages and believed he was striking out at evil when he killed.
Under Texas law, the jurors could rule that a defendant was not guilty by reason of insanity if they determined because of a brain disorder he was unable to determine right from wrong.
He was tried first for the 1998 slaying of Benton, a medical researcher who was raped and beaten to death. Her home was near railroad tracks, which was the signature of Maturino Resendiz's crime spree.
Maturino Resendiz was the subject of a massive, nationwide manhunt last year when the FBI placed him on its Ten Most Wanted list. He finally surrendered last July 13 to a Texas Ranger at El Paso, Texas.
