Experience: I know the date my husband is going to die

'I certainly never imagined I would fall for someone on death row'

'Death row inmates get virtually no phone privileges, so calling hasn’t been an option. We’ve never been able to touch.'

I was 45 years old and doing a criminal justice degree in Louisiana when I met Ivan Cantu. I'd written to a man on death row in Texas whose story I was interested in for my course. He had learning difficulties, and Ivan, his fellow inmate, replied for him, offering to assist with our correspondence. That was July 2005. Ivan and I wrote to each other during the next year and I began helping him with his appeal. Eventually I arranged to visit him. Death row was a horrifying place.

Ivan had been sentenced for murdering his cousin and his cousin's fiancee at their home in Dallas. At his trial, the state said it was a drug deal gone wrong. At first I thought he was guilty. As I read more about the crime, I didn't think he could have done it. But one of the first things I asked that visit was whether he had killed those people. "Oh my God, I did not," he replied.

The only picture I'd seen of Ivan was his mugshot online. I was expecting a scrawny mobster type, but when they brought him in, I fell in love. He has very kind, loving eyes. I didn't for a moment think he had the same feelings, but we talked as though we had been friends for years. I felt I knew him from his letters – he'd been very open in them.

Ivan thinks the victims were killed by rival drug dealers out to frame him – he had become mixed up with the wrong people. He was convicted largely on the testimony of his then girlfriend, who claimed he was covered in blood on the night of the murders, but apart from some blood-smeared jeans found in a bin in his home in Dallas (which were two sizes too big for him), no evidence ever linked Ivan to the crime scene. Phone records showed someone was in his house the night after the murders. That day Ivan and his girlfriend had taken a trip to Arkansas. Someone had known he would be out and had planted the jeans. I was determined to help Ivan after I realised he was innocent, but I would have helped him regardless – no one should face the death penalty.

In June 2006, 8 visits after we first met, Ivan sent me a letter saying he loved me. I hadn't told him of my feelings. I'd been divorced for more than 10 years and my son and daughter were in their 20s and had left home, but I wasn't looking for love. I certainly never imagined I would fall for someone on death row.

Every week or two I leave my house at 4am and make the four-and-a-half-hour trip to see him. We have only two hours together. Once every 2 or 3 months, I spend the weekend at a nearby hotel and visit Ivan on a Saturday and then again on Monday. We call that "spending the weekend together". Death row inmates get virtually no phone privileges, so calling hasn't been an option. We've never been able to touch.

It's tough. I feel I'm in a prison, too. Ivan wanted me to date and be able to have sex – he said I had to live my life. But I don't want to do that.

I told my friends at the casino where I work that I was writing to Ivan as part of my law degree, but when I said it was developing into something more, they asked if I was sure. I said I couldn't remember my life without him and they said they would support me, even offering to help pay for some of my trips. For a long time I didn't let my family know. One day my daughter and I were shopping and I was looking at cards for Ivan and she said: "Were you ever going to tell me you loved this guy?" I started to cry. The rest of my family think I'm crazy, but my daughter has met Ivan and likes him. She says she sees how much he loves me. In April 2007 he proposed and she stood in to read his vows for him at the county courthouse.

On 28 March this year I learned Ivan had been given an execution date: 30 August. I knew it would eventually happen, but it was still a shock. I fell apart. The next time I saw Ivan, we sat there crying. He was so frightened.

We're filing an appeal to the Supreme Court. If they turn us down we'll file to the clemency board, asking them to reverse his sentence to life in prison. I feel very isolated – nobody understands what I'm going through. If we're unsuccessful, I will be there for Ivan the day he is executed by lethal injection. It's not something I want to do, but I won't let him die alone.

Source: The Guardian, June 4 2011

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