Death Row, Execution

Cedric Allen Ricks | The Murder of Roxy & Her Boys

Cedric Allen Ricks turned a routine Walmart run into a massacre, ambushing 30-year-old Roxann Diana Sanchez and her sons inside their Bedford, Texas apartment – stabbing Roxann and 8-year-old Anthony to death and leaving 12-year-old Marcus clinging to life after he survived by playing dead.

Cedric Allen Ricks Mug Shot Photo

Cedric Allen Ricks | Pic Credit – tdcj.texas.gov

American Killer

Last updated: November 6, 2025

Cedric Allen Ricks | Death Row 2026

  • Offender: Cedric Allen Ricks – Texas death-row prisoner from Tarrant County, convicted of capital murder for the stabbing deaths of his girlfriend and her 8-year-old son inside their Bedford apartment.
  • Victims (fatal):
    • Roxann Diana Sanchez, 30 – Ricks’ girlfriend / ex-girlfriend, stabbed and beaten to death in her Bedford apartment.
    • Anthony Reyes Figueroa, 8 – Roxann’s younger son, stabbed and cut more than 40 times and pronounced dead at the scene.
  • Victims (surviving):
    • Marcus Figueroa, 12 – Roxann’s older son; stabbed around 25 times in the head, neck, back, chest, hands and face but survived by playing dead and later testified against Ricks.
    • Isaiah Ricks, 8–9 months – infant son of Roxann and Cedric; present during the attack but physically unharmed.
  • Location (crime): Colonial Village at Shore Creek apartments, 1400 block of Park Place Boulevard, Bedford, Texas (Tarrant County).
  • Date of attack: Evening of May 1, 2013.
  • Bodies discovered: Police responding to a 911 call found Roxann and Anthony dead inside the apartment; Marcus was gravely injured but alive and airlifted to Cook Children’s Medical Center; Isaiah was found uninjured in his crib.
  • Arrest: Arrested later that night by Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers, about 70 miles north of the Texas–Oklahoma border, while driving Roxann’s car. He was held in Garvin County, Oklahoma, then waived extradition and was returned to Tarrant County.
  • Primary conviction: Capital murder for killing more than one person (Roxann and Anthony) in a single criminal transaction. Additional count for causing serious bodily injury to a child (Marcus).
  • Conviction & sentence: May 8, 2014 – Jury convicts Ricks of capital murder after deliberating less than an hour.
    • May 16, 2014 – Jury sentences him to death after about seven hours of punishment-phase deliberations; judgment entered in the 371st District Court of Tarrant County.
  • Current status: On Texas death row at the Polunsky Unit, listed as serving a death sentence with no projected release; appeals through the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and federal courts have left his conviction and death sentence intact.
  • Execution date: Execution scheduled for March 11, 2026, set by a Tarrant County judge in October 2025 for the 2013 capital murders of Roxann Sanchez and her 8-year-old son.
  • Where to verify:

Classification & Characteristics

Cedric Allen Ricks is best understood as a domestic-violence–driven family annihilator, a man whose long-standing pattern of coercive control and brutality against women finally erupted into the lethal destruction of a household. Officially, he is a capital murderer who killed more than one person in a single criminal transaction. Behaviorally, he belongs in the category of offenders who treat partners and children not as people, but as property—and respond to loss of control with extermination.

Ricks had a documented history of violence against women long before May 1, 2013. His ex-wife and former girlfriends described years of verbal degradation, beatings, strangling, knife “games,” and open contempt for their safety—even telling one woman in the hospital, right after she delivered his child, “I hope it dies.” Those incidents show a pattern of instrumental cruelty: using fear and pain to keep women compliant, rather than “snapping” spontaneously. The Bedford attack slots neatly into that pattern—Ricks didn’t explode out of nowhere; he escalated into murder when his control was threatened.

Psychologically, his crime in Bedford reveals the classic traits of an intimate-partner batterer at the extreme end of the spectrum: entitlement, jealousy, a hair-trigger temper, and a willingness to punish defiance by destroying what the victim loves most. When Roxann tried to live her life without him, he answered by attacking her in front of her sons, then turning the knife on the children who dared to protect her. The overkill on eight-year-old Anthony—more than forty stab and cut wounds—and the sustained assault on Marcus suggest not just rage, but a chilling readiness to keep going until movement stopped. His calm clean-up afterward—shower, fresh clothes, bandaged cuts, packing a bag, placing the baby in a crib—underscores a dangerous combination of emotional coldness and practical focus: the kind of mindset that makes him exactly the sort of offender Texas built its capital-murder statute to catch.

Timeline of the Cedric Allen Ricks Case →

  • November 2012 – Prior domestic assault and protective order
  • Roxann Sanchez reports that Ricks strangled her and slammed her head on the floor. She’s treated in the ER, describing being choked until she passed out. A judge issues an emergency protective order barring Ricks from Roxann, her boys, their apartment, her work, and the children’s school; that order expires in January 2013.
  • May 1, 2013 – The Bedford double stabbing
  • Around 7 p.m., Roxann returns to their Bedford, Texas apartment from a grocery trip with her three sons: 12-year-old Marcus, 8-year-old Anthony, and 9-month-old Isaiah. An argument with Ricks turns violent inside the apartment. He beats and strangles Roxann, then arms himself with a kitchen knife and repeatedly stabs her as the boys try to intervene. Anthony is stabbed and cut more than 40 times. Marcus is stabbed in the head, neck, and back but survives by feigning death. Isaiah, the baby Ricks and Roxann share, is physically unharmed.
  • May 1, 2013, ~8:45 p.m. – 911 calls and police response
  • Ricks calls relatives and admits he has killed “Roxy and her boys,” asking them to retrieve Isaiah from the apartment. His cousin calls 911, triggering a welfare check. Inside, officers find Roxann and Anthony dead in a blood-soaked living room, Marcus gravely wounded, and Isaiah crying in his crib. Marcus tells a 911 operator that his mother’s boyfriend stabbed them and fled in her car.
  • Late May 1, 2013 – Arrest in Oklahoma
  • Using cell-phone “ping” data and the description of Roxann’s missing Nissan Altima, authorities track Ricks north into Oklahoma. Around 11 p.m., Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers stop the car and arrest him roughly 70 miles over the Texas–Oklahoma line. He’s booked into the Garvin County Jail, where other inmates assault him after learning the nature of his charges. Ricks later waives extradition and is returned to Tarrant County to face capital-murder charges.
  • 2013 – Capital murder indictment
  • Tarrant County prosecutors charge Ricks with capital murder for killing more than one person in the same criminal episode, naming both Roxann and Anthony as victims.
  • February 14, 2014 – State announces it will seek death
  • In pre-trial coverage, Tarrant County officials confirm they will pursue the death penalty rather than life without parole. Ricks’s capital trial is formally set for May 5, 2014, in the 371st District Court.
  • May 5, 2014 – Capital trial opens in Fort Worth
  • Jury selection and testimony begin in Judge Mollee Westfall’s courtroom. Marcus takes the stand and describes watching his mother and little brother die. Other witnesses, including Ricks’s ex-wife, later testify about years of escalating abuse and threats with knives.
  • May 8, 2014 – Guilty verdict
  • After less than an hour of deliberation, the jury finds Ricks guilty of capital murder for the stabbings of Roxann Sanchez and 8-year-old Anthony Figueroa in the Bedford apartment.
  • May 16, 2014 – Death sentence
  • Following about seven hours of punishment-phase deliberations, the jury answers the Texas special issues in favor of death. Ricks is formally sentenced to die. Prosecutors note he had previously rejected a plea offer for life without parole.
  • October 4, 2017 – Direct appeal denied
  • The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals unanimously affirms Ricks’s conviction and death sentence in Ricks v. State, No. AP-77,040, rejecting 20 points of error, including challenges to the warrantless entry, search, and various evidentiary rulings.
  • April 16, 2018 – U.S. Supreme Court declines review (direct appeal)
  • The U.S. Supreme Court denies Ricks’s petition for a writ of certiorari, leaving the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals’ decision intact.
  • November 18, 2020 – State habeas corpus denied
  • On post-conviction review, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denies Ricks’s state habeas application in Ex parte Ricks, No. WR-85,278-01, adopting the trial court’s findings and conclusions.
  • November 22, 2023 – Federal habeas denied
  • The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas denies Ricks’s federal habeas petition in Ricks v. Lumpkin, No. 4:20-cv-1299, rejecting all ten claims he raised.
  • November 4, 2024 – Fifth Circuit refuses certificate of appealability
  • In a published opinion, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals denies Ricks a certificate of appealability in Ricks v. Lumpkin, 120 F.4th 1287. One judge dissents, but the majority holds his claims are procedurally barred or not debatable among reasonable jurists.
  • April 15, 2025 – New cert petition filed in U.S. Supreme Court
  • Ricks files a fresh petition for a writ of certiorari (and in forma pauperis motion) asking the Supreme Court to review the Fifth Circuit’s denial of a COA, focusing on claims related to visible shackling at trial.
  • October 17, 2025 – Execution date order signed
  • After noting that Ricks has exhausted his state and federal remedies, a Tarrant County district judge signs an order setting his execution for March 11, 2026. The order is issued during National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and the DA’s office publicly ties the case to domestic-violence awareness.
  • Scheduled March 11, 2026 – Execution date
  • Ricks is currently slated to be executed by lethal injection at the Huntsville Unit in Texas. As of late 2025, he remains housed on death row at the Polunsky Unit, pending any last-minute legal action or clemency bid.

Cedric Allen Ricks | Death Row 2026

Case Summary

On the night of May 1, 2013, the Colonial Village apartments in Bedford, Texas, looked like any other mid-week stopover between Walmart and bedtime. Inside one of those third-floor units lived 30-year-old Roxann Diana Sanchez, her sons Anthony (8) and Marcus (12) from a prior marriage, and 9-month-old Isaiah, the baby she shared with her boyfriend, Cedric Allen Ricks. vLex

Shortly after 7 p.m., Roxann and the boys came home from a grocery run. A neighbor later described seeing Sanchez on the stairs with bags in her hands while Ricks cursed and yelled at her. What started as an argument in the stairwell continued inside the apartment, turning into a violent fight. According to trial testimony, Ricks threw Roxann to the floor, hitting and choking her until the boys ran from their bedroom to intervene. CBS News+1

Ricks then went to the kitchen, grabbed a knife, and began stabbing Roxann as she tried to shield herself. When he was done with her, he turned the blade on Anthony, who was later found to have more than 40 stab and cut wounds – a level of overkill that drove home how personal and prolonged the attack was. Terrified, Marcus ran to his bedroom closet, tried to call 911, and ended up in a direct struggle over the knife, slicing his own hands before Ricks chased him back into the living room and stabbed him repeatedly in the head, neck, and back. Marcus survived only because he played dead, mimicking the gurgling sound he’d heard his dying little brother make.

While Marcus lay on the floor near the bodies of his mother and brother, Ricks calmly cleaned up. He put the knife away, washed his hands, took a shower, changed clothes, bandaged his cuts, and packed a bag. He placed baby Isaiah in his crib and left in Roxann’s car. From the road he called family members, telling them he had “killed Roxy and her boys” and asking them to go retrieve Isaiah. Those relatives called 911. Meanwhile, once Marcus was sure Ricks was gone, he managed to call 911 himself. When Bedford officers entered the apartment, they found Marcus soaked in blood but alive, Roxann and Anthony dead on the floor, and Isaiah crying but physically unharmed in his crib. Marcus was flown by helicopter to Cook Children’s Medical Center and survived his injuries.

Police used his relatives’ information and Ricks’s cellphone to track him north. Around 11 p.m., about 70 miles into Oklahoma, state troopers stopped him driving Roxann’s car and arrested him. At the Garvin County Jail he was beaten by other inmates after they learned what he was accused of; he soon waived extradition and was returned to Tarrant County to face two counts of capital murder and an additional charge for seriously injuring Marcus.

At trial in 2014, prosecutors didn’t stop at the Bedford crime scene. They called Ricks’s ex-wife and former girlfriends, who described years of escalating domestic violence – being thrown to the ground while he stabbed the knife into the dirt around their heads, being choked unconscious outside a police station during a custody exchange, and even being told, right after childbirth, “I hope it dies.” Jurors heard that pattern and then looked at the photographs of Roxann and Anthony’s bodies, the autopsy results, and Marcus’s account of playing dead to survive. After convicting Ricks of capital murder, they took about seven hours to decide his fate: death. CBS News+1

On direct appeal, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals upheld his conviction and death sentence, summarizing the case as the May 1, 2013 murders of Roxann Sanchez and Anthony Figueroa in a single criminal transaction and confirming the details of the attack from Marcus and other evidence. vLex+1 In 2025, Tarrant County prosecutors successfully sought an execution date. Local reporting and court records now show Cedric Ricks is scheduled for execution on March 11, 2026, for the murders of Roxann and Anthony and the attempted murder of Marcus. Irving Weekly+2HERE Huntsville+2

→ Quick Answers

  • Who is Cedric Allen Ricks?
    Cedric Allen Ricks is a Texas death-row prisoner from Tarrant County, convicted of capital murder for the May 1, 2013 stabbings that killed his girlfriend, 30-year-old Roxann Diana Sanchez, and her 8-year-old son, Anthony Reyes Figueroa, inside their Bedford apartment, and for nearly killing 12-year-old Marcus Figueroa. CBS News+1

    Who were his victims?
    Ricks’ fatal victims were Roxann Sanchez and her 8-year-old son Anthony. Roxann’s older son, Marcus, was stabbed multiple times but survived after pretending to be dead. The baby in the home, Isaiah – Ricks and Roxann’s 9-month-old son – was the only child physically uninjured. CBS News+1

    What exactly happened inside the apartment?
    After Roxann and the kids came home from a grocery trip, an argument between her and Ricks turned into a violent assault. Ricks threw Roxann down, beat and strangled her, then grabbed a kitchen knife and stabbed her repeatedly. When Anthony and Marcus tried to protect their mother, he turned the knife on them – inflicting more than 40 stab and cut wounds on Anthony and repeatedly stabbing Marcus in the head, neck, and back until Marcus survived by playing dead. Ricks then showered, changed clothes, packed, and left, leaving two bodies, a gravely wounded child, and an infant behind. CBS News+1

    How did Marcus survive?
    Marcus first tried to hide in his bedroom closet and call 911 but was found by Ricks, who then chased and stabbed him. Marcus later testified that he imitated the gurgling sound his little brother made as he died; when Ricks heard that, he stopped stabbing. Marcus stayed motionless on the floor until he was sure Ricks was gone, then called 911 and lived to testify against him in court. CBS News+1

    How was Ricks caught?
    After the stabbings, Ricks drove away in Roxann’s car and called relatives, telling them he had killed “Roxy and her boys” and asking them to pick up Isaiah from the apartment. Those relatives called 911 and gave police his cellphone number. Using those calls and pings, authorities tracked him into Oklahoma, where state troopers stopped and arrested him about 70 miles north of the Texas–Oklahoma border later that night. He was jailed in Garvin County, beaten by inmates when they learned what he’d done, then waived extradition and was brought back to Tarrant County. CBS News+1

    Why was this a capital-murder case?
    Texas makes a murder “capital” when certain aggravating factors apply – one of them is killing more than one person during the same criminal transaction. Ricks was charged with capital murder for killing Roxann and Anthony in a single episode, with Marcus’s stabbing as an additional count. Those facts, plus the ages of the victims and the domestic-violence history, gave prosecutors a textbook capital case. vLex+1

    What role did his history of violence play at trial?
    During the punishment phase, prosecutors called Ricks’s ex-wife and former girlfriends, who described a long history of threats, strangling, beatings, and terrifying knife incidents – like him repeatedly stabbing the ground around his ex-wife’s head while threatening to kill her, choking her unconscious during a visitation exchange, and telling her “I hope it dies” after the birth of their child. That pattern helped convince jurors that the Bedford murders were the culmination of a long-running pattern of violent control, not a one-time outburst. CBS News+1

    Has he had an execution date yet?
    Yes. Tarrant County prosecutors obtained an execution setting for March 11, 2026. Local coverage and DA announcements state that Cedric Ricks is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection on March 11, 2026, for the murders of Roxann Sanchez and Anthony Figueroa. Irving Weekly+2HERE Huntsville+2

    What is his current status?
    Ricks remains on Texas death row, with his conviction and death sentence affirmed by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals and further challenges rejected in higher courts. With an execution date now set, his remaining options are limited to last-stage appeals and clemency attempts.

🕊️Victims of Cedric Allen Ricks

  • Roxann Diana Sanchez (30)
    Roxann Diana Sanchez was a 30-year-old mother raising three boys in a Bedford apartment when her relationship with Cedric Ricks turned fatal. On May 1, 2013, she came home from a Walmart trip with groceries and kids in tow, only to be confronted by Ricks outside and then attacked inside. During the assault, he threw her down, strangled her, and then stabbed her repeatedly with a kitchen knife in front of her children. The medical examiner later ruled she died from stab wounds to the neck, blunt-force trauma to the head and asphyxia.
    Roxann’s life becomes visible in the record mainly through trauma: a lapsed protective order, police contacts, and the testimony of a son who watched her die. In Bedford and in the courtroom, however, she is remembered first as a mother – the center of a small family that Ricks shattered in minutes.

    Anthony Reyes Figueroa (8)
    Anthony Reyes Figueroa was eight years old, the younger of Roxann’s two school-age sons. When his mother came under attack, Anthony tried to help Marcus protect her. Ricks turned on him with the knife, inflicting more than 40 stab and cut wounds – injuries so numerous that even seasoned professionals described them as a frenzy. Anthony died on the floor of the apartment before first responders could save him.
    In the legal paperwork, Anthony is “the 8-year-old victim” whose death supports the capital charge. In the story Marcus tells, he’s the little brother whose final gurgling breaths taught him how to fake his own death and live long enough to see justice done.

    Marcus Figueroa (12) – Survivor
    Twelve-year-old Marcus Figueroa stepped into the fight when Ricks attacked his mother, and paid for it with 25 stab wounds to his head, neck, back, chest, hands, and face. Terrified and bleeding, he hid in his closet trying to call 911, fought over the knife, and ultimately survived by going limp and imitating the choking sound his brother made as he died. After Ricks left, Marcus got up, called 911, and was flown to Cook Children’s Medical Center, where he recovered from his injuries.
    Years later, he took the stand in the Tarrant County courtroom, describing in excruciating detail how his mother and brother were killed and how he tricked Ricks into believing he was dead. His testimony was central to both the conviction and the jury’s decision to impose a death sentence.

    Isaiah Ricks (Infant) – Surviving Child
    Isaiah Ricks was about 8–9 months old at the time – the only child Cedric and Roxann shared together. He was in the apartment during the attack but was never physically harmed; Ricks placed him in his crib before leaving in Roxann’s car. Police found him alive when they entered the bloody scene, and he was later placed under the care of Child Protective Services.
    Isaiah never appears in autopsy reports or injury charts; his presence is a reminder that one child from that home will grow up with no conscious memory of that night – but entirely shaped by what it did to the rest of his family.

Cedric Allen Ricks | Death Row 2026

→ FAQs

Who is Cedric Allen Ricks and what was he convicted of?

Cedric Allen Ricks is a Texas death-row prisoner from Tarrant County. In May 2014, a jury convicted him of capital murder for the May 1, 2013 stabbings that killed his estranged girlfriend, 30-year-old Roxann Diana Sanchez, and her 8-year-old son, Anthony Reyes Figueroa, in their Bedford apartment. He was also held responsible for nearly killing Sanchez’s 12-year-old son, Marcus, in the same attack.

What happened inside the Bedford apartment on May 1, 2013?

That evening, Roxann returned home from a Walmart trip with her three sons – Marcus, Anthony, and 9-month-old Isaiah – when an argument with Ricks erupted at the Colonial Village at Shore Creek apartments. Inside, Ricks threw her to the floor and strangled her; when Marcus and Anthony tried to protect their mother, he grabbed a kitchen knife and stabbed Roxann repeatedly. He then turned on the boys, inflicting more than 40 stab and cut wounds on Anthony and stabbing Marcus in the head, neck, back, and elsewhere. Marcus survived by playing dead – imitating the gurgling noise he heard Anthony make as he died – and later called 911 once Ricks left. Isaiah, the baby Ricks and Roxann shared, was found physically unharmed in his crib.

Were there warning signs or prior protections in place before the murders?

Yes. Months before the killings, Roxann had reported that Ricks choked her and injured one of her boys, leading a judge to issue a protective order that barred him from contact with her, the children, and their home. That order expired in January 2013, and the murders occurred a few months later, on May 1, 2013, in the same Bedford apartment. The Dallas Morning News notes that by the time Ricks killed Roxann and Anthony, he had already been barred from seeing Isaiah because of that earlier choking incident.

What is Ricks’ current legal status and execution date?

Cedric Ricks remains on Texas death row. His conviction and death sentence were upheld by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in 2017, and the U.S. Supreme Court later declined to intervene. After state and federal habeas challenges were also denied, a Tarrant County judge signed an order on October 17, 2025, scheduling his execution. According to court records and local reporting, Cedric Allen Ricks is currently set to be executed by lethal injection on March 11, 2026, in Huntsville, Texas.
→ TDCJ – Scheduled Executions

Cedric Allen Ricks | Death Row 2026

👉 The Story

A Trip and A Trap

On the evening of May 1, 2013, 30-year-old Roxann Sanchez did something utterly ordinary: she went to Walmart with her kids for groceries. Riding back with her were her 12-year-old son Marcus Figueroa, 8-year-old Anthony Reyes Figueroa, and her baby, Isaiah, the 9-month-old son she shared with her boyfriend, Cedric Allen Ricks. They pulled into their complex on Park Place Boulevard in Bedford, the Colonial Village at Shore Creek apartments, expecting nothing more dramatic than hauling bags up the stairs.

Instead, Cedric Allen Ricks was waiting.

As they arrived, he came out of the apartment, already furious and screaming at Roxann in the parking lot. The argument didn’t cool once they crossed the threshold. Inside, it escalated fast: Ricks threw Roxann to the floor, hitting and choking her as the boys watched their mother get rag-dolled around their living room. That was the moment Marcus and Anthony stepped in. They weren’t bystanders anymore; they were defenders. CBS News+1

The Knife and the Living Room Slaughter

When the boys tried to pull him off her, Ricks shifted gears from strangling to stabbing. He grabbed a kitchen knife and began plunging it into Roxann in front of her children. The attack on her was savage – and it was only the beginning. Once he was done with their mother, he turned the blade on Anthony, the younger boy.

Medical and trial testimony later described Anthony’s wounds in terms that stunned even seasoned courtroom veterans: more than 40 separate stab and cut injuries on the 8-year-old’s body. Each wound spoke to how personal, how sustained and how merciless the assault had been. CBS News+1

Marcus, watching his little brother butchered, did the only thing left to do: he ran.

Marcus Fights, Plays Dead, and Saves Himself

Marcus fled to his bedroom, dove into the closet, and tried to dial 911 on his phone. He was 12 years old, hiding in the dark, listening for footsteps. When Ricks tore open the closet door, Marcus dropped the phone and grabbed at the knife, slicing his own hands badly as he fought to get it away. He broke free and bolted back toward the living room, but couldn’t outrun a grown man in a frenzy.

Ricks caught him, slammed him to the floor, and stabbed him over and over – head, neck, back – until Marcus could feel his body starting to shut down. When Ricks finally walked away, Marcus tried to stand, and the knife came down on him again. Only when the boy made a wet, choking noise like the sound he’d heard from dying Anthony did Ricks seem to decide he was finished. CBS News+1

Marcus did the one thing that could still save him: he went still. On the blood-slicked carpet, surrounded by the bodies of his mother and brother, he pretended to be dead.

From the floor, he could hear Ricks moving casually around the apartment: taking a shower, changing clothes, bandaging his own cuts, packing a bag. The baby, Isaiah, was unharmed but now effectively abandoned in the middle of a crime scene. When the front door finally closed behind Ricks and the apartment went quiet, Marcus forced himself up, found his phone, and called 911. He told the dispatcher that his brother wouldn’t answer him and that he was hurt all over. First responders rushed in; Marcus was airlifted by helicopter to Cook Children’s Hospital and somehow survived wounds that easily could have killed him.

“I Killed Roxy and Her Boys”

Ricks didn’t call 911. He didn’t check on the baby. Instead, he grabbed Roxann’s car and headed north. On the road, he phoned relatives and, according to court records, told them bluntly that he had killed “Roxy and her boys” and asked them to go retrieve Isaiah from the apartment. Those relatives called 911 instead. That call, combined with Marcus’s emergency call, gave police the fuller picture: two children and their mother stabbed in Bedford, the baby miraculously unhurt, and the suspect running for the state line in the victim’s vehicle. CBS News+1

Investigators pinged Ricks’s cellphone and realized he was already across the Red River. Just under three hours after the murders, Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers stopped him roughly 70 miles north of the Texas–Oklahoma border and arrested him on a Texas warrant while he was still driving Roxann’s car. He was booked into the Garvin County Jail, where other inmates, having heard what he was accused of, beat him badly enough that it made the news.

At first, Ricks tried to fight being brought back to Texas. The next morning, he changed his mind, stood briefly before an Oklahoma judge, and waived extradition. By that afternoon he was headed back to Tarrant County to face two counts of capital murder for killing Roxann and Anthony, plus a serious-bodily-injury charge for what he’d done to Marcus. Isaiah, the only child he hadn’t laid a hand on, went into the custody of Child Protective Services.

A Long Trail of Violence Comes Into Focus

The guilt phase of the trial made it clear what happened on May 1, 2013. The punishment phase answered the question who Ricks had been long before that night.

Prosecutors called his ex-wife and two former girlfriends, and together they drew a chilling portrait of a man whose violence against women had been escalating for years. One woman described how he once threw her to the ground, pinned her, and repeatedly drove a knife into the dirt next to her head and face in a mock execution. Another recounted a custody exchange in Illinois where he choked her unconscious outside a police station. His ex-wife told jurors that after she delivered their child, he looked at the newborn in the hospital and told her, “I hope it dies.” CBS News+1

Those stories, layered on top of the Bedford crime scene, gave the jury exactly what prosecutors wanted them to see: not a man who “snapped” one night in 2013, but a serial abuser who had finally taken his rage all the way to homicide. When they returned to the courtroom on May 16, 2014, their answer was clear. They sentenced Cedric Allen Ricks to death for the murders of Roxann Sanchez and Anthony Figueroa, and for the terror and lifelong trauma he inflicted on the one boy who lived to testify against him.

Legal Status | Paper Trail | Cedric Allen Ricks

  • Legal Status | Paper Trail | Cedric Allen Ricks
  • Trial Court – Tarrant County
  • Court & Cause: 371st District Court, Tarrant County, Texas – Cause No. 1361004R.
  • Conviction: On May 8, 2014, a Tarrant County jury found Cedric Allen Ricks guilty of capital murder for killing 30-year-old Roxann Diana Sanchez and her 8-year-old son, Anthony Reyes Figueroa, in their Bedford apartment on May 1, 2013.
  • Sentence: On May 16, 2014, after about seven hours of punishment deliberations, the jury answered Texas’s special issues in favor of death. Judge Mollee Westfall signed the judgment assessing death on the capital charge, with an additional conviction for seriously injuring 12-year-old Marcus Figueroa.
  • Direct Appeal – Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
  • Case: Ricks v. State, No. AP-77,040 (Tex. Crim. App. Oct. 4, 2017).
  • Key holdings:
    • The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) affirmed both the conviction and death sentence, rejecting challenges to the warrantless entry of the Bedford apartment, evidentiary rulings, jury instructions, and sufficiency of the evidence.
    • The opinion recites the core narrative: Ricks killed Roxann and Anthony, gravely wounded Marcus, then fled in Roxann’s car and admitted to relatives that he had killed “Roxy and the boys.”
  • U.S. Supreme Court – Direct Review
  • Ricks petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court for certiorari after the CCA affirmance. The State’s Brief in Opposition summarizes that he had been “properly convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Roxann Sanchez and her eight-year-old son, Anthony.” The Court later denied certiorari, leaving the CCA judgment intact.
  • State Habeas Corpus – Texas
  • Case: Ex parte Ricks, No. WR-85,278-01 (Tex. Crim. App. Nov. 18, 2020).
  • Ricks filed a state habeas application raising multiple constitutional claims, including complaints about visible shackling at trial and ineffective assistance of counsel.
  • The CCA adopted the trial court’s findings and denied relief in full, holding that his shackling claim was procedurally barred (not raised on direct appeal) and that he had not shown his lawyers were constitutionally ineffective.
  • Federal Habeas – U.S. District Court (N.D. Tex.)
  • Case: Ricks v. Lumpkin, No. 4:20-cv-1299 (N.D. Tex. Nov. 22, 2023).
  • Ricks sought federal habeas relief on ten claims, including due process violations over shackling and ineffective assistance.
  • The district court denied the petition and refused a certificate of appealability, concluding that any exposure of shackles to the jury was invited error and that, in any event, he had not shown prejudice.
  • Federal Habeas – U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
  • Case: Ricks v. Lumpkin, 120 F.4th 1287 (5th Cir. 2024), No. 23-70008 (Nov. 4, 2024).
  • The Fifth Circuit denied a certificate of appealability, holding that his key shackling claim was procedurally defaulted and that reasonable jurists would not debate the district court’s rejection of his other claims.
  • Judge Higginson dissented in part, arguing that the shackling issue deserved appellate review, but the majority’s opinion controls.
  • U.S. Supreme Court – COA / Shackling Petition
  • Case: Ricks v. Guerrero, No. 24-7038 – Petition for writ of certiorari filed April 15, 2025, asking the Court to review the Fifth Circuit’s handling of his shackling and certificate-of-appealability issues.
  • The petition argues that the Fifth Circuit improperly denied a COA by relying on a procedural-default theory that the district court never used, and that visible shackling at trial was a serious constitutional error.
  • Execution Warrant / Date
  • In October 2025, after state and federal challenges had been rejected, a Tarrant County judge signed an order setting March 11, 2026 as Ricks’s execution date. Local reporting notes that the DA’s office announced the date during National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, tying the case to domestic-violence awareness efforts.
  • Ricks is currently listed among pending U.S. executions for March 11, 2026, on independent tracking sites.
  • Current Status
  • As of now, Cedric Allen Ricks remains on Texas death row at the Polunsky Unit, under a final capital conviction with an active execution date of March 11, 2026, pending any last-minute judicial action or clemency.

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Beyond the Gavel | Cedric Allen Ricks

Roll Card | Snapshot | Cedric Allen Ricks (TX)

Snapshot:
On May 1, 2013, Cedric Allen Ricks turned a Bedford apartment into a domestic-violence kill zone. After an argument with Roxann Diana Sanchez, he tackled and strangled her in front of her sons, then armed himself with a kitchen knife and stabbed Roxann and 8-year-old Anthony Reyes Figueroa to death. Twelve-year-old Marcus Figueroa survived around 25 stab wounds by playing dead; baby Isaiah was left crying in his crib. A Tarrant County jury convicted Ricks of capital murder in May 2014 and sentenced him to death. His conviction and sentence were upheld on direct appeal and through state and federal habeas review. With an execution date now set for March 11, 2026, Ricks stands as one of Tarrant County’s most notorious intimate-partner killers.

Verification:

Docket Map – Proceedings (Condensed)

From Bedford living room to Huntsville death chamber – the legal road map.

  • May 1, 2013 – Double homicide in Bedford, Texas
    Roxann Sanchez and her 8-year-old son Anthony are stabbed to death; Marcus survives; Isaiah is unharmed. Ricks flees in Roxann’s car and is arrested later that night in Oklahoma.
  • May 2014 – Trial, conviction, and death sentence (Tarrant County)
    Ricks is tried in the 371st District Court. The jury finds him guilty of capital murder on May 8 and sentences him to death on May 16.
  • October 4, 2017 – Direct appeal affirmed
    The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals issues its opinion in Ricks v. State, No. AP-77,040, upholding the conviction and death sentence.
  • 2018 – U.S. Supreme Court declines direct review
    After a cert petition and the State’s brief in opposition, SCOTUS denies certiorari, leaving the CCA’s judgment intact.
  • November 18, 2020 – State habeas denied
    In Ex parte Ricks, No. WR-85,278-01, the CCA adopts the trial court’s findings and denies his state habeas application.
  • November 22, 2023 – Federal habeas denied (N.D. Tex.)
    The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas rejects his federal habeas petition and denies a certificate of appealability.
  • November 4, 2024 – Fifth Circuit denies COA
    In Ricks v. Lumpkin, 120 F.4th 1287 (5th Cir. 2024), the Fifth Circuit denies a certificate of appealability, over a partial dissent by Judge Higginson.
  • April 15, 2025 – SCOTUS shackling/COA petition filed
    Ricks files a cert petition (Ricks v. Guerrero, No. 24-7038) challenging the Fifth Circuit’s COA procedure and raising his shackling claim.
  • October 2025 – Execution date set
    A Tarrant County judge signs an order setting Ricks’s execution for March 11, 2026. The DA’s office publicly links the date to domestic-violence awareness efforts.

Stay / Warrant / Window

  • Death Warrant & Date:
    Ricks currently has an execution date of March 11, 2026, for the 2013 capital murders of Roxann Sanchez and Anthony Figueroa. The warrant was set in October 2025 by a Tarrant County judge after state and federal courts denied relief.
  • Legal “Window”:
    With the Fifth Circuit denying a COA and a cert petition pending (or recently filed) in the U.S. Supreme Court, Ricks is in the narrow pre-execution window where remaining avenues are limited to:
    • Last-minute Supreme Court action on his shackling/COA petition
    • Possible subsequent applications in state court
    • A clemency request to the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles and the Governor
  • Where he is now:
    Ricks remains housed at the Polunsky Unit on Texas death row; if the date holds, he will be transported to the Huntsville Unit for execution.

Case File Extras | What the Record Shows

The parts of the record that don’t fit in a headline, but tell you who he really is.

  • Prior Strangling, Expired Protection
    Months before the murders, Roxann went to an ER and told a triage nurse she’d been choked until she passed out, and that her boyfriend had been arrested in Bedford. The CCA’s opinion notes a protective order that barred Ricks from contacting her, the children, and their home—an order that expired just a few months before he killed her.
  • Domestic Violence as Prequel, Not Surprise
    Trial and punishment-phase testimony from an ex-wife and ex-girlfriends painted a pattern: Ricks throwing women to the ground, stabbing the ground around their heads with a knife, choking one unconscious outside a police station during a visitation exchange, and telling a woman in the hospital after childbirth, “I hope it dies.” This wasn’t a one-day blowup; it was the endpoint of years of escalating abuse.
  • The Shackling Fight – Future Dangerousness on Display
    The most hotly litigated issue now isn’t guilt, but shackling. In both the federal district court and Fifth Circuit, Ricks argues his visible shackles and shock belt – highlighted by the State during punishment closing to argue future dangerousness—violated due process and that his lawyers failed him by not objecting. His cert petition to the Supreme Court is less about whether he killed Roxann and Anthony, and more about how a death sentence can be secured when a jury sees a defendant chained.
  • Domestic Violence Month, Domestic Violence Case
    When the DA’s office announced the March 11, 2026 execution date, they did it during National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, explicitly tying Ricks’s case to the broader problem of intimate-partner violence and lethal escalation. That framing makes this more than a local murder case; it turns Roxann’s story into a symbol.

Source Pack

High-yield links you can click to verify almost every line of the post.

Core Legal Documents

News & Execution-Date Sources

Source Pack – Cedric Allen Ricks (TX Death Row)

Official Records & Case Law

Federal Appeals & High Court Filings

Crime & Trial Coverage

Background, Domestic Violence, and Mitigation Evidence

Death Penalty Status & Scheduling

HereHuntsville – “Execution Date Set For Cedric Ricks – Texas Death Penalty”
Secondary summary of his case and the March 11, 2026 execution date.
👉 https://www.herehuntsville.com/execution-cedric-ricks-texas/ herehuntsville.com

Death Penalty Information Center – Upcoming Executions
National list confirming March 11, 2026 – TX – Cedric Ricks as a scheduled execution.
👉 https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/upcoming-executions deathpenaltyinfo.org

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