(HorizonPost.com) – A former Houston-area police officer was finally executed after nearly 30 years, according to The Daily Mail. In 1994, Robert Fratta had hired two hitmen to kill his wife, Farah, when their divorce turned sour, in the midst of a heated custody battle over their three sons.
Fratta, 65, spent 27 years on death row. He was finally executed by lethal injection at Huntsville prison in Texas. He reportedly refused to give a final statement, saying, “No,” as his spiritual advisor Barry Brown held his hand and prayed over him.
Brown prayed for the “hearts that have been broken…for people who grieved and those who will grieve in days ahead,” and asked for God to “be merciful to Bobby.”
Fratta’s eldest son, Bradley Baquer, was present at the time the injection was being administered. He watched through the window but Fratta did not acknowledge him or look in his direction before taking a deep breath and closing his eyes.
Prosecutors say that Fratta hired the hitmen through a middleman, Joseph Prystash, who then hired the shooter, Howard Guidry, to ambush Farah. His wife was shot in the head twice in their garage. Neighbors called the police after witnessing the shooting.
Fratta was a public safety officer for Missouri City and maintained his innocence, but investigators reportedly became suspicious when they learned of the fierce custody battle between the couple. Court documents also showed that the divorce was because of Fratta’s multiple extramarital affairs.
The lethal injection was delayed for more than an hour that day as the final appeals cleared in the U.S. Supreme Court and Texas’ highest courts, the Texas Supreme Court and Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Fratta’s lawyers were unsuccessful in convincing the court that a trial witness was hypnotized by investigators, which allegedly changed her testimony that she saw two men at the murder scene.
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