Texas death row inmate who murdered woman before drowning her child in bathtub to be executed today

A Texas inmate who stabbed his estranged wife to death and drowned her six-year-old daughter in the bathtub more than a decade ago is due to be executed tonight.

Gary Green, 51, receives a lethal injection for the September 2009 death of Lovetta Armstead, 32, and her daughter, Jazzman Montgomery, who were murdered in their Dallas home.

In previous appeals, Green’s lawyers had alleged that he was mentally retarded and had a lifelong history of psychiatric disorders.

As of late Monday, no appeals had been filed to stop his execution, which is scheduled for 6 p.m. local time at the state penitentiary in Huntsville, Texas.

“These impairments likely did not enable (Green) to form the required intent to commit capital murder,” Green’s lawyers wrote in 2018.

Those appeals were rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court and lower courts of appeals.

The Supreme Court has banned the death penalty for people with intellectual disabilities, but not for people with serious mental illness.

The girl’s father, Ray Montgomery, said he does not welcome Green’s execution, but sees the justice system working.

“It is justice for the way my daughter was tortured. It’s justice for the way Lovetta was killed,” Montgomery said.

Authorities said Green killed the two after Armstead tried to annul their marriage.

On the day of the murders, Armstead had written two letters to Green, telling him that while she loved him, she should “do what’s best for me.”

In his own letter, which was angry and incoherent, Green expressed a belief that Armstead and her children were involved in a plot against him.

“You asked to see the monster so here he is the monster you made for me… They will be taken 5 lives today, I’m the 5th,” Green wrote.

Armstead was stabbed more than twenty times while Green Jazzman drowned in the house’s bathtub.

Authorities said Green also planned to kill Armstead’s two other children, then 9 and 12. Green stabbed the younger boy, but both survived.

“Told (Green) because we’re too small to die and we won’t tell anyone about it,” the 9-year-old told jurors in testimony about how he convinced Green to spare their lives.

Josh Healy, one of the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office prosecutors who convicted Green, said the boys were incredibly brave.

Lovetta Armstead, 32, (left) was stabbed to death and her daughter, Jazzman Montgomery, (right) drowned in the bathtub at their Dallas home in 2009

Green’ was a bad guy. It was one of the worst cases I’ve ever been a part of,” said Healy, who now practices law in Dallas.

Montgomery said he still has a close relationship with Armstead’s two sons. He said they both lead productive lives and one has a daughter who looks like Jazzman.

“They’re still suffering a lot, I think,” says Montgomery, a special education English teacher.

Montgomery, who is a deacon at his Dallas church, said he has continued to live his life as if his daughter is still here, including throwing a party for her every birthday. He also had a high school graduation party for her, including a parade at her grave and a backyard barbecue with family.

“That was my way of dealing with it, of making it feel like she’s still there. I prayed over her grave one day and I told her I would never let her name die out,” Montgomery said.

Green’s execution is the first of two scheduled for this week in Texas. Another inmate, Arthur Brown Jr., will be executed on Thursday.

He would be the fourth inmate in Texas and the eighth in the US to be executed this year.

Green is one of six death row inmates in Texas who are part of a lawsuit to prevent the state’s prison system from using what they believe is expired and unsafe execution drugs.

Despite a civil judge in Austin tentatively agreeing to the demands, three of the prisoners were executed this year.