John Allen Rubio was executed by lethal injection at the state prison in Huntsville, Texas, after a conviction for fatally stabbing and beheading his three young children in 2003, The Guardian reported.
The 46-year-old inmate was pronounced dead at 6:47 p.m. on Thursday, according to The Guardian’s reporting. His execution and another in Oklahoma brought the national total to 37 this year.
Rubio’s killings of three-year-old Julissa Quesada, 14-month-old John E. Rubio, and two-month-old Mary Jane Rubio shocked a community along the US-Mexico border, as noted by The Times of India. The apartment building where the crimes took place was eventually demolished, and the land became a park and community garden.
Before the lethal dose of pentobarbital took effect, Rubio delivered a final statement thanking friends and family for their support. “I want to say I’m sorry to my wife’s family,” Rubio said, according to The Independent. “I can’t change the past but I can tell you my life is going to be over. But that’s not going to make you happy.”
He also expressed love for Angela Camacho, his common-law wife, who is serving a life sentence for her involvement in the murders.
“I’m going to be with my kids in a little bit,” Rubio added. “I’m ready to go to heaven to be with my lord and savior.”
Defense experts during his trials diagnosed Rubio with paranoid schizophrenia and testified that a childhood marked by domestic violence, drug use, and prostitution damaged him developmentally, though prosecution experts disputed the diagnosis. An appeals court previously overturned his first capital murder conviction due to improperly admitted evidence, but a jury convicted him again at a 2010 retrial.
Hours prior to Rubio’s execution, 73-year-old James Pavatt received a lethal injection at an Oklahoma prison for the 2001 murder of Rob Andrew, a 39-year-old advertising executive. Pavatt had been having an affair with the victim’s wife, Brenda Andrew, and the two men attended the same church. Brenda Andrew was convicted at a separate trial.
Thursday’s events marked the 36th and 37th executions in the United States this year, keeping the country on pace to surpass 40 executions for a year, a frequency largely driven by Florida. The ongoing executions follow renewed scrutiny on capital punishment after a failed execution attempt involving Christa Pike in Tennessee in September, alongside California Governor Gavin Newsom’s announcement on November 5 to commute hundreds of death sentences before leaving office.
