This photo provided by the Oklahoma Department of Corrections shows James Pavatt in Feb. 2023. (BRYAN TERRY/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK; Oklahoma Department of Corrections via AP)
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An Oklahoma man convicted of plotting with his lover to kill her estranged husband 25 years ago was executed Thursday without uttering any final words.
James Pavatt, 73, was put to death by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester for the 2001 murder of Rob Andrew, a 39-year-old advertising executive who was gunned down in his garage while picking up his two young children just before Thanksgiving.
Pavatt was pronounced dead at 10:12 a.m. local time, according to the Oklahoma Department of Corrections. Prison officials described the execution as “uneventful,” adding that Pavatt had no last words, according to local news station KOKH.
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This photo provided by the Oklahoma Department of Corrections shows James Pavatt in Feb. 2023. (Oklahoma Department of Corrections via AP)
For his last meal, Pavatt requested a strawberry milkshake and a barbecue dinner of smoked chicken, brisket, pulled pork, fried okra, baked beans and pickles, KOCO reported.
Pavatt was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder. He had been having an affair with Rob Andrew’s wife, Brenda Andrew, who was convicted in a separate trial and also sentenced to death.
Weeks before the killing, Rob Andrew told police someone was trying to kill him after the brake lines on his car were cut.
The Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, Okla., Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2021. (BRYAN TERRY/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK)
Brenda Andrew later claimed masked intruders shot her in the arm and fatally shot her husband at the Oklahoma City home the couple previously shared. Prosecutors, however, said she and Pavatt plotted the murder.
The pair fled to Mexico with Brenda Andrew’s two children after the shooting but were arrested three months later while reentering the United States.
At a clemency hearing last month, Pavatt maintained his innocence and claimed Brenda Andrew had manipulated him.
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“It was not until my trial that I began to see the extent to which I had been manipulated by Brenda,” he told the board. “I can see why the jury believed that we were both involved in Rob’s murder.”
An entrance sign and guard tower at Oklahoma State Penitentiary. (Shepard Sherbell/CORBIS SABA/Corbis via Getty Images)
Prosecutors maintained that both were equally responsible for the killing, regardless of who fired the fatal shots.
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Pavatt’s execution was the first of two scheduled in the United States on Thursday. In Texas, John Allen Rubio, 46, was set to be executed that evening for the 2003 stabbing and beheading of three young children he was raising in Brownsville. The victims were 3 years old, 14 months old and 2 months old.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.