Daijiworld Media Network - Texas
Texas, Nov 13: A Texas man convicted of fatally stabbing and beheading three young children in a 2003 killing spree was executed on Thursday evening, hours after another man was put to death in Oklahoma.
John Allen Rubio, 46, was pronounced dead at 6.47 pm following a lethal injection at the state prison in Huntsville, Texas.
The killings of a two-month-old girl and two toddlers in a windowless apartment in Brownsville, near the US-Mexico border, had shocked the city. The apartment building was later demolished and the site converted into a park and community garden.
Before his execution, Rubio thanked his friends and family for their love and understanding. He said he was no longer the person he once was and expressed gratitude to prison staff for helping him find God.
He also expressed love for his common-law wife, Angela Camacho, who is serving a life sentence for her role in the killings.
Rubio apologised to his wife's family, saying he could not change the past. He also said he was ready to go to heaven and be with his Lord and Saviour.
According to prison officials, the lethal injection took effect shortly after it was administered, and a physician pronounced him dead 21 minutes later.
Rubio and Camacho were accused of killing three children — three-year-old Julissa Quesada, 14-month-old John E Rubio and two-month-old Mary Jane Rubio — in the apartment they shared in Brownsville.
Camacho received a life sentence after pleading guilty.
Rubio's first capital murder conviction was overturned by an appeals court, which ruled that Camacho's statements had been improperly admitted as evidence. However, at his second trial, Rubio was again convicted and sentenced to death after pleading not guilty by reason of insanity.
Court records stated that Rubio was not the biological father of the two older children but had treated them as his own. He had reportedly claimed at various points that the children were possessed and that he was the chosen one meant to save the world.
Defence experts diagnosed Rubio with paranoid schizophrenia, although prosecution experts disputed the finding. His defence team also cited a troubled childhood marked by domestic violence, drug use and other adverse experiences.
In a separate execution earlier on Thursday, Oklahoma put 73-year-old James Pavatt to death for the 2001 murder of his girlfriend's estranged husband, Rob Andrew.
Pavatt was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in the fatal shooting of Andrew, a 39-year-old advertising executive, who was killed while arriving to pick up his two young children before Thanksgiving.
Pavatt had been having an affair with Andrew's wife, Brenda Andrew, and attended the same church as the family. Brenda was convicted in a separate trial and remains the only woman on Oklahoma's death row.
The two executions brought the total number of executions in the United States this year to 37, with the country on course to exceed 40 for the second consecutive year.
Meanwhile, former Oklahoma death row inmate Richard Glossip pleaded guilty on Thursday to a lesser charge of being an accessory in a 1997 murder. He is awaiting sentencing in December after spending nearly 30 years in prison. His murder conviction had earlier been overturned by the US Supreme Court.