Texas executed John Rubio on Thursday evening, Nov. 12, for the 2003 killings of three young children in Brownsville. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice said Rubio, 46, received a lethal injection and was pronounced dead at 6:47 p.m. His execution was the first of two scheduled in the state within a week.
In his final remarks, Rubio expressed gratitude to friends, relatives and prison administrators for their religious support. He said he continued to love his common-law wife, Angela Camacho, and apologized to both her family and his own. Camacho is serving three life sentences for her involvement in the killings. Rubio also spoke about forgiveness and acknowledged that his death would not change the past.
Rubio was convicted in 2003 of stabbing and beheading his two children, 2-month-old Mary Jane Rubio and 1-year-old John Esteban Rubio, along with Camacho’s daughter, 3-year-old Julissa Angela Quezada. Court records show that he told law enforcement he thought the children were possessed.
That conviction was overturned in 2007. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals determined that prosecutors had improperly used statements Camacho made outside court before she invoked her Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination. Rubio was tried again and pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. A second jury convicted him in 2010.
On Nov. 5, the criminal appeals court rejected Rubio’s final appeal. His challenge alleged that an expert psychiatric witness for the prosecution had provided false testimony concerning his mental health history.
Rubio separately sought to stop his execution through a lawsuit filed against the state in August with fellow death row inmate LeJames Norman. They asked a Travis County district judge to prohibit Texas from using pentobarbital for lethal injections. The lawsuit argued that the state’s supply had either expired or had been produced through unreliable methods at third-party compounding facilities. The challenge failed, and Norman was executed Sept. 16.
Rubio was the eighth man Texas executed in 2026. The state has one more execution scheduled before the end of the year: Reinaldo Dennes is set to be put to death Nov. 19 following his 1997 conviction for a deadly robbery in Houston.
Texas also has three executions scheduled for 2027.
