The Oklahoma Department of Corrections provided this photo of James Pavatt in February 2023. (Bryan Terry/The Oklahoman/USA TODAY Network; Oklahoma Department of Corrections via AP)
An Oklahoma man convicted of conspiring with his lover to kill her estranged husband was executed Thursday, ending a 25-year-old case. James Pavatt made no final statement.
Pavatt, 73, was put to death by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester for the 2001 murder of Rob Andrew. The 39-year-old advertising executive was shot in his garage as he went to pick up his two young children shortly before Thanksgiving.
The Oklahoma Department of Corrections said Pavatt was pronounced dead at 10:12 a.m. local time. Prison officials characterized the execution as “uneventful” and said he did not offer any last words, according to local station KOKH.
The Oklahoma Department of Corrections provided this photo of James Pavatt in February 2023. (Oklahoma Department of Corrections via AP)
Pavatt’s final meal included a strawberry milkshake and a barbecue spread featuring smoked chicken, brisket, pulled pork, fried okra, baked beans and pickles, KOCO reported.
He was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder after having an affair with Brenda Andrew, Rob Andrew’s wife. Brenda Andrew was convicted in a separate trial and also received a death sentence.
Several weeks before the killing, Rob Andrew told police that someone was trying to kill him after the brake lines on his vehicle had been cut.
The Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, Oklahoma, on Nov. 17, 2021. (Bryan Terry/The Oklahoman/USA TODAY Network)
Brenda Andrew later told authorities that masked intruders had shot her in the arm and killed her husband at the Oklahoma City home the couple once shared. Prosecutors disputed that account, arguing that Andrew and Pavatt had planned the murder.
After the shooting, the two fled to Mexico with Brenda Andrew’s children. They were arrested three months later while returning to the United States.
During a clemency hearing last month, Pavatt continued to deny responsibility and said Brenda Andrew had manipulated him.
“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 the Oklahoma State Penitentiary. (Shepard Sherbell/Corbis Saba/Corbis via Getty Images)
Prosecutors argued that both defendants bore equal responsibility for the killing, regardless of which person fired the fatal shots.
Pavatt’s execution was the first of two scheduled in the United States on Thursday. In Texas, John Allen Rubio, 46, was scheduled to be executed later 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.