Texas, Oklahoma Men Executed on the Same Day

Detailed summary

James Pavatt in Oklahoma and John Rubio in Texas were executed Thursday. Rubio beheaded three children in Brownsville in 2003.

Texas executed a Brownsville man Thursday for beheading three young children in 2003, hours after Oklahoma put a man to death for a 2001 murder-for-hire killing of his lover's estranged husband, the second time this year the two states have carried out executions on the same day.

The executions are the latest to follow Tennessee’s failed lethal-injection attempt on Christa Pike September 30, when she survived two doses of pentobarbital. Governor Bill Lee then paused executions in the state and ordered an outside review.

Since Tennessee's failure, at least eight people have now been put to death nationwide. Together, Texas and Oklahoma have carried out 12 executions this year, still well behind Florida, which has killed 19, tying the state record it set last year.

John Allen Rubio, 46, was pronounced dead at 6:47 p.m. after a lethal injection at the state prison in Huntsville.

He was convicted of the 2003 stabbing and beheading of 3-year-old Julissa Quesada, 14-month-old John E. Rubio and 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio inside the apartment he shared with his girlfriend, Angela Camacho.

Camacho pleaded guilty to three counts of capital murder to avoid the death penalty in 2005 and is serving three life sentences.

Investigators say Rubio and Camacho killed the children because they couldn’t support them. Rubio previously said the children were decapitated because he believed they were possessed by his dead grandmother.

Rubio was originally convicted and sentenced to death in 2003, but the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturned the conviction in 2007. He was retried in 2010, found guilty a second time of capital murder and again sentenced to death.

Last month, a state district judge found Rubio legally competent to face execution after reviewing psychiatric evaluation findings. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals recently rejected a motion by Rubio’s defense attorneys requesting a stay of execution.

Opening of the article, excerpted from Newsweek. To read the rest, open the article on the publisher's site.