Investigations revealed that Robert Alan Fratta (February 22, 1957 – January 10, 2023), a police officer and the estranged husband of Farah, had masterminded her murder by hiring two men to kill her, for which the motive was related to the unresolved divorce lawsuit between the couple and their fight for custody of their children.
The hired gunman, Howard Paul Guidry (born April 15, 1976), was in turn recruited by Prystash to carry out the murder itself.
Fratta, who denied masterminding his wife's murder and maintained his innocence, was executed by lethal injection on January 10, 2023, after his appeals against the conviction failed.
In 1983, Farah married her husband Robert Alan Fratta, who was a public safety officer in Missouri City, Texas, U.S.
Farah reportedly submitted that one of her grounds for divorce was due to her husband's bizarre and deviant sexual demands.
The divorce lawsuit progressed before the courts for two years without any conclusion reached, and the Frattas fought for the custody rights of their two sons and one daughter.
[4] In 1994, Fratta, then 37 years old, approached his gym friend, 38-year-old Joseph Andrew Prystash, who agreed to help him find a gunman to do the job.
[4] According to court and media sources, Farah was at her house's garage when she encountered Howard Guidry, who acted on the instructions of Fratta.
Guidry wielded a gun and fired two shots, which all struck 33-year-old Farah Fratta on the head, killing her on the spot.
The Family Court Judge Robert Hinojosa reportedly reprimanded Fratta to be unfit as a parent due to his alleged involvement in the murder, which caused greater harm to his children than himself who possibly instigated the crime, and his conduct and judgement were "seriously impaired".
A few days later, Mary Gipp, Prystash's girlfriend, informed the police that Guidry was involved in Farah's murder.
[4] Unrelated to the case, William Edward "Bill" Planter, a former policeman, was arrested for allegedly asking Farah's father to allow him to kill Fratta.
[18][19] After their arrests, between March and April 1995, all the three perpetrators – Joseph Prystash, Robert Fratta and Howard Guidry – were charged with capital murder, an offence that carries either life imprisonment or the death penalty under Texas state law.
It was also revealed during the trial that as rewards for the contract killing of his wife, Fratta offered to pay Guidry US$1,000 and Prystash US$2,000 and a jeep.
[25] Clinical psychologist Laurence Abrams, a prosecution medical expert, also testified that Fratta harboured both lack of appreciation of other people's feelings and regarded women as "little girls" who could easily be dominated by men.
[28] During the sentencing phase, Betty Baquer, the 59-year-old mother of Farah, was allowed to make a victim impact statement, and she labelled her former son-in-law as a "monster" for having caused her daughter's death and the case's aftereffects in their lives.
[54][55] On October 1, 2007, Robert Fratta successfully appealed for a new trial, after U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon of a federal district court found that the prosecution's case against Fratta heavily relied on the confessions of both Prystash and Guidry, and there were questionable circumstances behind the trial procedure and conduct of the prosecution and police investigators.
[57] The original trial witnesses, including Prystash's then girlfriend Mary Gipp, returned to court to testify on behalf of the prosecution and defence.
The trio argued that the use of expired drugs for their upcoming executions amounted to a cruel and unusual punishment, which was in violation of their constitutional rights and several state laws.
Fratta's attorneys presented their case to the U.S. Supreme Court, claiming that the trial prosecutors had concealed evidence indicating that a witness had been hypnotized by investigators.
This hypnosis caused her to alter her original statement, in which she had reported seeing two men at the murder scene along with a getaway driver.
The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately ruled against the defence and dismissed Fratta's appeal, and ordered the execution to move forward.
[78] On January 10, 2023, 28 years and two months after the murder of his wife, 65-year-old Robert Alan Fratta was put to death by lethal injection at the Huntsville Unit.
Kahan told the Associated Press that Farah's father died in 2018, and described Fratta as a coward for soliciting his wife's murder and not acknowledging the presence of his son or former brother-in-law, as well as not offering an apology for his actions.
[85] In 2010, the case of Farah Fratta's murder was covered by 48 Hours Mystery, a true crime series ran by CBS News.