'Texas 7' member volunteers to be executed

This week, Rodriguez is set to become the first of the six surviving members of the infamous "Texas 7" -- all of them now on death row -- to go to the death chamber.

"I'm glad we got caught, so no one else would get hurt," Rodriguez said, discussing with a reporter for the first time his involvement in the crime spree eight years ago.

Rodriguez, 45, said he welcomes this week's execution, set for Thursday.

"I have a lot of people here telling me how unfair the system is," he told The Associated Press in what he said would be his first and last media interview. "At some point in our lives, you have to have some sort of accountability. I can't see how people in my situation deny that."

Rodriguez, who first went to prison with a life sentence for arranging the 1992 slaying of his wife in San Antonio, worked for more than a year to convince the courts he was competent to drop his appeals and volunteer for execution.

"I'm just moving forward," Rodriguez said from a small visiting cage at the Polunsky Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, site of the state's death row. "Look. I'm guilty of what they said -- everything."

And he said he wants the family of his former wife, Theresa, and the relatives the slain police officer "to know how truly sorry I am and I am willing to pay."

"I think it's a fair sentence," he added. "I need to pay back. I can't pay back monetarily. This is the way."

The slain police officer's wife, Lori Hawkins, calls Rodriguez's apologies "a little too late."