The 20th Execution of 2017
Robert Lynn Pruett was executed in Texas on October 12,
2017. He was the 1,462nd person
executed in the United States since 1976, the 544th person executed
in Texas, and the 1,287th person executed by lethal injection.
According to The Marshall Project, Pruett was serving a 99-year sentence for a murder in Harris
County, Texas, when he fatally stabbed Correctional Officer Daniel
Nagle at the McConnell Unit in Beeville, Texas.
The incident began when a correctional officer took Pruett
to get new shoes, causing him to miss the distribution of lunches. Instead of
his normal meal, Pruett was given a sack lunch, which he took to the prison
recreation area, in violation of unit rules. Nagle told Pruett he would have to
eat his lunch before entering the recreation area and wrote up a disciplinary
complaint.
Later that afternoon, Pruett stabbed Nagle eight times with
an improvised knife. The weapon was found beside Nagle's body, along with the
disciplinary complaint, which had been torn into several pieces. An autopsy
report indicated Nagle had died of a heart attack after the stabbing. Multiple
inmates testified at trial that they had witnessed the attack, describing
Pruett as excited and covered in blood afterwards. Others testified that Pruett
had vowed to kill Nagle. Pruett claimed Nagle had been killed by prison gang
members to prevent him from exposing prison corruption. At trial, his attorneys
argued that the Pruett's fingerprints were not found on the weapon, nor was the
victim's blood found on the prisoner.
On appeal, Pruett contended he had suffered ineffective
counsel, because his lawyer failed to develop mitigating factors. In rejecting
the assertion, courts noted that Pruett failed to identify the factors he
desired to be developed. In April 2015, Pruett's scheduled execution was halted
to allow for DNA testing of the weapon in the hope that another individual's
DNA would be revealed. The attempt was not successful.
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