A U.S. Air Force veteran convicted in a 2001 Oklahoma murder is scheduled to be executed this November. His attorneys plan to raise his military service in an effort to spare his life.
James Pavatt, 72, is currently scheduled to die by lethal injection on Nov. 12 at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, according to an announcement made Aug. 28 by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals.
If it is carried out, the execution would be the state’s fourth and final one of 2026.
Pavatt, a former life insurance agent, was convicted of first-degree murder in the killing of Robert “Rob” Andrew, a 39-year-old Oklahoma City advertising executive, according to the Oklahoma Voice. Andrew was shot with a shotgun in the garage of his home on Nov. 20, 2001, after arriving to pick up his two children.
Prosecutors alleged that Pavatt and Andrew’s wife, Brenda, with whom Pavatt was having an affair, plotted the killing to collect on an $800,000 life insurance policy. Pavatt, who had worked with the family through a church, had helped set up that policy, according to trial testimony.
Claims of Innocence and a Clemency Plea
Pavatt has maintained his innocence. His lead attorney, Hunter Labovitz, argued that there is no credible evidence that Pavatt fired the fatal shots.
“There’s absolutely no credible evidence that Jim shot and killed Rob Andrew, and that’s what he’s under a sentence of death for,” Labovitz, also an assistant federal defender, said in court, according to local ABC affiliate KOCO 5.
His defense is focused on clemency. Pavatt’s application to the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board is due Sept. 18. The board is scheduled to hold a clemency hearing on Oct. 14.
If the board recommends mercy, Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt could commute the sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Among the arguments his attorneys are expected to raise is his time in the Air Force. Pavatt served in the military before his conviction. His defense has described him as a decorated veteran who had never been in trouble with the law.
His execution date will arrive two days after his 73rd birthday.
Two Death Sentences
Brenda Andrew was tried separately and also sentenced to death.
She is the only woman on Oklahoma’s death row and is appealing her conviction. She is being held at the Mabel Bassett Correctional Center, a women’s prison.
After the killing, Pavatt and Brenda Andrew reportedly fled to Mexico with the couple’s two children before they were arrested and returned, according to multiple news outlets.
Pavatt was tried first, in 2003. A jury recommended a death sentence after convicting him of first-degree murder and conspiracy. A judge formally imposed the sentence that October.
He has since spent more than two decades on death row, exhausting a series of appeals that have upheld his conviction.
The path now narrows down to the clemency process and any remaining court action. Barring a commutation or a stay, Pavatt is scheduled to become the fourth person executed by Oklahoma this year.
Pavatt’s execution remains subject to the outcome of his clemency hearing, as well as any late appeals. His attorneys said they intend to keep fighting the sentence in the weeks leading up to the execution.
Read the full article here