Cedric Ricks, who was found guilty in 2014 of the double murder, is the second inmate the state has executed in 2026.
Cedric Ricks, who was convicted of capital murder in 2014 for stabbing his common-law wife and her 8-year-old son to death in their North Texas apartment, was executed Wednesday evening.
Ricks was executed by lethal injection and pronounced dead at 6:55 p.m., according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. In his final statement, Ricks apologized repeatedly to the family of Roxann Sanchez and Marcus Figueroa, who survived the attack.
“I can’t imagine the pain it has caused you, I’m glad I am able to speak to tell y’all that face–to–face,” Ricks said. “To Marcus, I always thought about you and I’m sorry that I took your mom and your brother away.”
In 2013, Ricks stabbed Sanchez and her two sons from a previous marriage, 8-year-old Anthony and then-12-year-old Marcus, during an argument in their Bedford apartment, according to court records. Sanchez and Anthony died during the attack, but Marcus survived after playing dead and was recovered by police shortly afterward.
Ricks and Sanchez also had a 9-month-old child, whom Ricks did not harm. Before fleeing the apartment, he placed the infant in a crib.
After the attack, Ricks fled to Oklahoma and called a family member and allegedly confessed to the killings. The family member then contacted the police, according to court and TDCJ records. Upon his conviction, Ricks was sentenced to death in 2014.
The U.S. Supreme Court denied Ricks’ appeal for a stay of execution on Wednesday. The application sought to overturn a March 4 ruling by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals that denied his request for a stay on procedural grounds without reviewing the merits of the case. The Supreme Court previously denied an appeal from Ricks in 2025 that alleged constitutional violations for allowing the jury in his trial to see him in shackles, which a Supreme Court precedent has ruled can unfairly sway sentencing.
A separate appeal from Ricks, denied by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2024, also alleged that the prosecution struck two potential black jurors because of their race.
Ricks’ execution is the second in Texas this year. Three other men on the state’s death row currently have scheduled executions, with James Broadnax scheduled to be executed on April 30.
Broadnax was convicted of capital murder in the 2009 fatal shootings of two men during a robbery in Garland, Texas. At his trial, 40 pages of rap lyrics that referenced robbery and murder written by Broadnax were presented as evidence against him by prosecutors. On Monday, several nationally recognized rappers, including Houston-born artist Travis Scott, filed amicus briefs in support of Broadnax’s appeal in the Supreme Court arguing the inclusion of the lyrics was erroneous and racially charged.
Source: Ayden Runnels,
Photo Credit: The exterior of the Huntsville Unit, where Texas executes death row inmates, on Oct. 17, 2024. Mark Felix for the Texas Tribunne
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