CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — The organizers of the Tejano Music Awards have rescinded a Lifetime Achievement Award offer to Grupo Mazz co-founder and convicted sex offender Joe Lopez after the honor's announcement was met with fierce public backlash.
The non-profit Texas Talent Musicians Association was scheduled to honor the 73-year-old singer during Saturday's annual awards show.
In 2006, Lopez was convicted of two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child and one count of indecency with a child. His 13-year-old niece testified in court that he raped her in 2004. Lopez maintains his innocence.
At the time of his conviction, he and co-founder Jimmy Gonzalez had gone their separate ways and were traveling with their own versions Grupo Mazz. Gonzalez toured until his death in 2018, which also was the year Lopez was paroled after serving almost 12 years of his 32-year sentence.
Lopez was scheduled to perform at the event and receive the award Saturday during the Tejano Music Awards' 43rd installment at the Boeing Center at Tech Port in San Antonio.
Wednesday, an announcement was posted in Spanish to his Facebook page that, loosely translated, reads:
"It's with deep sorrow we announce to our beloved fans that we, unfortunately, will not be presenters (sic) at the '43rd Tejano Music Awards' event for reasons beyond our control and having to do with the event's organizers'.
We had excitedly looked forward to the opportunity to reunite at this event.
We're grateful for everyone's understanding and the support you have always given us; We anxiously await the opportunity to reunite at future events."
The letter is signed Joe Lopez y Grupo Mazz.
"It was a hard decision to make," said TTMA vice-president Frank Salazar told the San Antonio Express-News on Thursday. "But we listened to what everybody was saying, what everybody was writing and decided this was the right thing to do."
He is still eligible for Album of the Year and Male Vocalist of the Year.
Tejano songwriter Humberto 'Beto' Ramon will now be the award's sole recipient.