Texas man scheduled to be executed for killing ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend | Texas
A Texas man who once escaped custody and was on the run for three days after being sentenced to death for fatally shooting his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend nearly 27 years ago was scheduled on Wednesday to become the first person executed in the United States this year.
Charles Victor Thompson was convicted of shooting and killing his ex-girlfriend Glenda Dennise Hayslip, 39, in April 1998; and her new boyfriend, Darren Keith Cain, 30, at her apartment in the Houston suburb of Tomball.
Thompson, 55, was scheduled to receive a lethal injection Wednesday evening at the state prison in Huntsville.
Prosecutors say Thompson and Hayslip had been in a romantic relationship for a year but broke up after Thompson “became increasingly possessive, jealous and abusive.”
Hayslip and Cain were dating when Thompson arrived at Hayslip’s apartment and began arguing with Cain around 3 a.m. the night of the murders, according to court records. Police were called and Thompson was told to leave the apartment complex. Thompson returned three hours later and shot Hayslip and Cain, who died at the scene. Hayslip died in hospital a week later.
“The Hayslip and Cain families have waited for more than twenty-five years for justice to be served,” prosecutors with the Harris district attorney’s office said in court records.
Thompson’s lawyers asked the U.S. supreme court to delay his execution, arguing that Thompson was not allowed to rebut or confront the prosecution’s evidence that concluded Hayslip died from a gunshot wound to the face. Thompson’s attorneys argued that Hayslip actually died due to faulty medical care he received after the shooting, resulting in severe brain damage from oxygen deprivation after botched intubation.
The Texas pardon and parole board on Monday rejected Thompson’s request to commute his death sentence to a lighter sentence.
“Had he been able to raise a reasonable doubt as to the cause of Ms. Hayslip’s death, he would not have been guilty of capital murder,” Thompson’s attorneys said in their filing to the high court.
Prosecutors said the jury had already rejected the allegation and concluded that Thompson was responsible for Hayslip’s death under state law because it “would not have occurred without his conduct.”
Hayslip’s family filed a lawsuit against one of his doctors, alleging that medical negligence during his treatment led to his brain death. In 2002, a jury ruled in the doctor’s favor.
Thompson’s death sentence was overturned and a new criminal trial was opened in November 2005. The jury returned the verdict that he should once again die by lethal injection.
Shortly after being offended, Thompson escaped from the Harris County jail in Houston out the front door, facing almost no objection from deputies. Thompson later told The Associated Press that after meeting with his lawyer in a small interview cell, he took off his handcuffs and orange jail jumpsuit and left the unlocked room. Thompson waived an ID card made from a prison ID card to get past several deputies.
“I smelled the trees, felt the wind in my hair, felt the grass under my feet, saw the stars at night. Being outside on a summer night took me right back to my childhood,” Thompson said of his three days on the run in a 2005 interview with the AP. He was arrested in Shreveport, Louisiana, while trying to arrange a wire transfer from abroad to reach Canada.
If executed, Thompson would be the first person executed in the United States this year. Texas has historically carried out more executions than any other state; However, Florida was the state with the most executions in 2025, with 19 executions.
