As reported in this local article, a "Texas death row inmate with claims that he was intellectually disabled was executed Wednesday at the Huntsville 'Walls' Unit for stabbing his two stepsons during an attack more than 12 years ago in their North Texas home that also killed his wife." Here is more:
Robert Sparks, 45, was apologetic to his family for the September 2007 slayings of 9-year-old Harold Sublet and 10-year-old Raekwon Agnew in their Dallas home.
“I am sorry for the hard times and what hurts me is that I hurt y’all,” Sparks said in his last statement. He was declared dead at 6:39 p.m., approximately 23 minutes after the lethal process began.
Prosecutors say Sparks' attack began when he stabbed his wife, 30-year-old Chare Agnew, 18 times as she lay in her bed. Sparks then went into the boys' bedroom and separately took them into the kitchen, where he stabbed them. Raekwon was stabbed at least 45 times. Authorities say Sparks then raped his 12- and 14-year-old stepdaughters.
His attorneys fought his appeal until the final minute, arguing that the jury specifically relied upon “the false testimony of prosecution expert A.P. Merillat when sentencing him to death. The appeal also claimed that the courtroom bailiff wore a syringe tie on the date of jury deliberations, “creating an unacceptable risk of impermissible factors coming into play at trial.”
Notably, as revealed in this SCOTUS order, Justice Sotomayor thought this claim about a syringe tie justified stopping his execution. Here is her dissent from the Supreme Court's denial of a stay for Sparks:
The allegations presented in this petition are disturbing. On the day the jury began punishment deliberations in petitioner Robert Sparks’ capital murder trial, one of the bailiffs on duty in the courtroom wore a black tie embroidered with a white syringe — a tie that he admitted he wore to express his support for the death penalty.
That an officer of the court conducted himself in such a manner is deeply troubling. Undoubtedly, such “distinctive, identifiable attire may affect a juror’s judgment.” Estelle v. Williams, 425 U.S. 501, 504–505 (1976). The state habeas court, however, conducted an evidentiary hearing but did not find sufficient evidence to conclude that the jury saw the tie. I therefore do not disagree with the denial of certiorari. I nevertheless hope that presiding judges aware of this kind of behavior would see fit to intervene in future cases by completely removing the offending item or court officer from the jury’s presence. Only this will ensure the “very dignity and decorum of judicial proceedings” they are entrusted to uphold. Illinois v. Allen, 397 U.S. 337, 344 (1970). The stakes — life in this case, liberty in many others—are too high to allow anything less.
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