When “Good Time” Goes Bad

A habitual felon released in 1993 after serving 11 years of a 30 year sentence for murder, has been charged with killing two additional victims while on parole. The Associated Press reports that in 1982, Raul Meza Jr., was sentenced to prison for the rape and murder of 8-year-old Kendra Page, whose body was found in a dumpster near her school in Austin. The sentence was the result of a plea bargain which dropped the rape charge, but the judge added 16 years to Meza’s sentence for a prior armed robbery conviction. Despite facing 46 years in prison, Meza was released early under then-Governor Ann Richards’ prison reforms, which granted him generous “good time” credits for participating in prison programs.

NBC’s KXAN reports that a year after his release Mesa was sent back to prison for violating the conditions of his parole. He was released and sentenced to  jail or halfway houses for continued violations several times. In 2019 Austin police investigated the murder of Gloria Lofton, a woman who lived next door to Mesa. The next year a DNA match linked Mesa to the murder.  In 2023, now living with 80-year-old Jesse Fraga, police found Fraga’s body during a welfare check and recovered video of Mesa on security camera footage at the crime scene at the time of the murder.

Mesa should never have received a plea bargain for Kendra Page’s rape and murder.  It was a death penalty offense and he deserved it. But in 1982 the nation was still experimenting with alternatives to tough law enforcement and Texas, despite its reputation, was included.  For a child rapist/murderer to be released after serving less than a third of his sentence on “good time” credits was deplorable, and protesters to his early release drove Mesa out of six cities. His multiple parole violations provided another signal that this murderer was not rehabilitated, yet he continued to get released.  If convicted of either or both recent murders Mesa will, once again, be eligible for a death sentence. He is asking for a plea bargain in which he would serve 50 years in prison, if the state will take the death penalty off the table. Hopefully, this time he has run out of luck.

We would welcome an anti-death penalty advocate to make the case that showing compassion for Raul Mesa was the right thing to do.