James Pavatt faces a Nov. 12 execution by lethal injection for the 2001 murder-for-hire of Oklahoma City advertising executive Robert Andrew.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals set the date Thursday, Aug. 27, Oklahoma Voice reported. Pavatt, 72, would be put to death at Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. The execution would be Oklahoma's fourth of 2026.

Pavatt's attorney objected to the scheduling.

"This case should not be scheduled for execution given the material questions yet to be answered," said Hunter S. Labovitz, assistant federal public defender.

The nature of those unresolved questions was not detailed in the court proceedings. Pavatt maintains his innocence.

The 2001 killing

Prosecutors alleged Pavatt shot Robert Andrew, 39, in the garage of Andrew's Oklahoma City home on Nov. 20, 2001. Andrew had arrived to pick up his two children for Thanksgiving visitation. He was shot twice with a shotgun around 7 p.m., according to court records.

Pavatt, a life insurance agent, had helped Andrew set up an approximately $800,000 Prudential life insurance policy. Prosecutors said the payout was part of the motive.

Pavatt and Andrew's wife, Brenda Andrew, were having an affair while the Andrews were going through a divorce, according to the Oklahoma Voice report, which cited earlier news coverage. Within days of the shooting, Pavatt and Brenda Andrew fled to Mexico with the couple's two children. They were apprehended trying to re-enter the United States in late February 2002, according to court records.

Conviction and appeals

An Oklahoma County jury convicted Pavatt of first-degree murder on Sept. 14, 2003, and sentenced him to death two days later.

In June 2017, a three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the death sentence in a 2-1 ruling. The panel found insufficient evidence to support the "especially heinous, atrocious or cruel" aggravating factor. The full 10th Circuit reinstated the sentence in June 2019 by a 10-3 vote. Pavatt lost his final U.S. Supreme Court appeal on Jan. 28, 2020.

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond requested the execution date after the Aug. 13 execution of Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez, the state's third lethal injection this year.

Co-defendant still on death row

Brenda Andrew, 62, was tried separately and also sentenced to death. She is the only woman on Oklahoma's death row and is held at Mabel Bassett Correctional Center in McLoud. The 10th Circuit denied her latest appeal on Jan. 13, 2026, affirming her conviction and death sentence.

A clemency hearing for Pavatt is scheduled Oct. 14. His execution date falls two days after what would be his 73rd birthday.