Bio

Calvin Letroy Hunter was born on April 30, 1971, in Duval County, Florida, and worked as a laborer. As a child, at age eight while in the third grade, a school psychologist administered intellectual and adaptive behavior testing that found him to have a verbal IQ of 65, a performance IQ of 68, and a full-scale IQ of 64 on the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. He was identified by his school district as "educable mentally handicapped" and placed in special education. 

According to family testimony at his later trial, Hunter progressed slowly academically, had behavioral problems, and was expelled from elementary school for fighting, he remained in special education classes through high school, was required to repeat the tenth grade, and ultimately graduated with a "special diploma" after completing the eleventh grade. Prior to the events described below, Hunter had one prior out-of-state criminal commitment and had previously served a two-year Texas sentence out of Harris County for possession of a firearm by a felon.

Murder Story

In September and October 2003, Hunter was connected by court testimony to a series of robberies and shootings in Houston. On September 2, 2003, he robbed people at gunpoint at the Ambassador North Apartments. On September 15, 2003, he robbed a Taco Bell, fired several shots at an employee, and then shot another man in the chest while fleeing through a nearby backyard. On October 23, 2003, he robbed a Kentucky Fried Chicken and shot employee Elijah Mitchell in the stomach.

On October 25, 2003, Hunter entered the Beauty Max store in Houston, Texas. The store owner, Jong Suk Choi, was working inside. A surveillance video shown to the jury showed Hunter entering the store, asking about merchandise, then drawing a pistol and shooting Choi in the head without warning. After shooting Choi, Hunter demanded money from Choi’s wife. The video showed her crying and screaming as she stepped over her husband’s body to open the cash register.

Choi died from the gunshot wound. TDCJ’s case summary states that Hunter robbed the store clerk of an unknown amount of money, shot him once in the head, fled the scene, and was arrested about one month later.

Hunter’s violence continued after Choi’s murder. On November 7, 2003, he fired six shots at Danny Patel at the Crystal Inn after Patel investigated a sudden blackout. On November 10, 2003, Hunter robbed the Ori Sub Sandwich Shop and shot employee To Duong in the leg. Two days later, on November 12, 2003, he robbed a Stop-N-Shop convenience store, pistol-whipped Nguyen Tan Lu, and shot her, killing her.

Hunter was later arrested and charged with capital murder for the killing of Choi. The Harris County case was tried in the 230th Judicial District Court. On July 14, 2004, the jury convicted Hunter of capital murder. During the punishment phase, prosecutors presented evidence of his prior violent conduct and the later killing of Nguyen Tan Lu.

Hunter’s defense argued that he should not be sentenced to death because he had intellectual disability. The jury rejected that claim. On July 27, 2004, the jury sentenced him to death. TDCJ later listed him as received on death row on August 5, 2004.

Hunter appealed. On November 7, 2007, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed his conviction and death sentence. The court also upheld the jury’s finding that Hunter had not proven intellectual disability under the legal standard being used at that time.

The case later changed because of problems involving the State’s intellectual-disability expert, Dr. George Carl Denkowski. In 2011, Denkowski entered into a settlement with the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists and agreed not to perform forensic intellectual-disability evaluations in criminal cases. Because Denkowski had testified for the State in Hunter’s trial, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals later reconsidered Hunter’s claim.

On March 9, 2016, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted punishment-phase relief. The court found that Denkowski had provided materially incorrect testimony regarding the intellectual-disability issue and remanded the case for a new punishment hearing. His sentence was commuted to life on September 16, 2016. His new TDCJ number is 2163699.