HUNTSVILLE, Texas — Richard Lee Tabler was pronounced dead at 6:38 p.m. on Valentine’s Day, ending a two-decade journey through the Texas death penalty system that began with four murders committed over a span of ten days in 2004
The 46-year-old inmate received a lethal injection at the Huntsville Unit, the state’s execution chamber, after the U. S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in his case
He had been on death row for nearly 20 years following his conviction for two of the four killings he admitted to committing.
Tabler’s final statement was directed at the families of his victims, offering repeated apologies for crimes he acknowledged he had no right to commit. “There is not a day that goes by that I don’t regret my actions,” he said. “I had no right to take your loved ones from you.”
The execution proceeded without the customary special last meal request. Texas Department of Criminal Justice officials confirmed that Tabler ate from the standard prison menu, declining the option to select a final meal of his choosing.
According to witnesses, Tabler mouthed the words “I’m sorry” again as the lethal drugs began to flow. He took approximately a dozen rapid breaths before all movement ceased. He was pronounced dead at 6:38 p.
m. Central Time.
The case dates back to November 18, 2004, when Tabler, then 25, had a falling out with his former boss, Muhammad Amina Ramuni, the manager of a Killeen strip club called Teasers. Tabler claimed Ramuni threatened his family, and he began plotting revenge.
Over the following week, Tabler methodically prepared. He borrowed a 9mm pistol, acquired a camcorder, and obtained a pickup truck. On Thanksgiving night, he lured Ramuni to a business lot with the promise of cheap stereo equipment.
Ramuni did not come alone. He brought a friend, Hyam Zed, who was driving. When the car pulled into the dark lot around 2 a.
m. , Tabler opened fire with the 9mm, striking both men. He then approached the vehicle and fired again at Ramuni, who was still clinging to life.
Standing nearby was 18-year-old Timothy Payne, Tabler’s accomplice, who filmed the entire attack with the camcorder. Tabler later showed the footage to his roommate before destroying it, then called the Bell County Sheriff’s Office himself.
“I killed them,” Tabler told the dispatcher. But he added something more chilling: he wasn’t done yet.
Two days later, on November 28, 2004, Tabler acted on that warning. He had compiled a list of 11 names, all connected to the strip club. At the top were 18-year-old Tiffany Dodson and 16-year-old Amanda Benfield.
Tabler lured the two teenage girls to a remote lake with promises of drugs. Once there, he shot them both repeatedly. He later claimed he believed they had tipped off police about the Thanksgiving murders, a suspicion that was never confirmed.
The girls’ bodies were discovered the following day by an employee of the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Tiffany was identified quickly, but Amanda’s identity took until December 4th to confirm. She was a runaway from Louisiana who had been reported missing.
After the second double murder, Tabler called the sheriff’s office again. This time, he taunted authorities, bragging about the killings and threatening more violence if the club was not shut down. He warned he would target remaining staff and even police.
Tabler’s troubled history preceded these crimes. Born February 5, 1979, in Tehama County, California, he entered a fractured family. Court records revealed his father had pushed for an abortion and was largely absent throughout his childhood.
Diagnosed with ADHD at age 12, Tabler struggled in school and failed third grade. His mother left the family when he was 10, and he bounced between homes in California, Florida, and Nevada, developing a violent temper that surfaced repeatedly in his teenage years.
By adulthood, Tabler had accumulated a criminal record that included burglary charges, assaulting a police officer, and escaping custody while handcuffed. He once kicked out the windows of a patrol car and later threatened his parole officer’s family.
Ironically, Tabler was arrested on the same day he murdered Dodson and Benfield, but on unrelated felony theft charges. Detectives already suspected his involvement in the Thanksgiving killings, and during questioning the next day, Tabler confessed to all four murders.
He also implicated Timothy Payne, who was arrested hours later. Payne was charged with two counts of capital murder for the Thanksgiving night killings and was convicted on November 15, 2007. He received life without parole and will not be eligible for parole until 2044.
Despite his confession, Tabler pleaded not guilty in court and later claimed his confession was false. The strategy failed. On April 2, 2007, a jury sentenced him to death for the murders of Ramuni and Zed.
Prosecutors never pursued separate charges for the teenage girls’ killings.
The legal years that followed were marked by contradictions. Tabler sometimes said he was ready to die, then fought to stay alive with appeals that blamed lawyers, mental illness, and anyone but himself. Every motion failed.
Every appeal was denied.
In 2008, Tabler obtained a smuggled cell phone and called Texas State Senator John Whitmire, threatening the legislator and his family. The call triggered a statewide prison lockdown and erased any remaining public sympathy for the condemned man.
In the years that followed, Tabler claimed to have changed. He said he found God, took up drawing and writing, and mentored other inmates. He even raised a baby lizard in his cell, naming it Little Blue and teaching it tricks.
His wife, whom he met through a prison letter-writing program, defended him publicly. “I’ve never met anyone, even out here in the free world, with a heart bigger than his,” she said. His family echoed that sentiment, describing him as a caretaker behind bars.
But Texas officials and the victims’ families were not swayed by the late-life transformation. The violence that placed Tabler on death row remained the defining fact of his life, and the state proceeded with the execution date.
On February 14, 2025, eight days after his 46th birthday, Tabler was escorted into the execution chamber at Huntsville. He delivered his final statement, addressing the families directly.
“No amount of my apologies will ever return them to you,” he said, after asking for forgiveness and expressing regret for his actions. He thanked his family, legal team, and prison staff for their support.
Tabler apologized several more times before telling the warden, “I am finished.” Those were his final words as the lethal injection began to flow.
Witnesses described Tabler mouthing “I’m sorry” one last time before his breathing became rapid. After about a dozen breaths, all movement stopped. The execution was complete.
Tabler was pronounced dead at 6:38 p. m. , leaving behind a case that investigators described as one of the most disturbing in Bell County history.
The list of 11 names was never fully acted upon, but four families lost loved ones.
Amanda Benfield was just 16 years old when she died. Tiffany Dodson was 18. Muhammad Amina Ramuni and Hyam Zed lost their lives over a dispute stemming from a strip club disagreement that spiraled into a campaign of vengeance.
The execution drew attention from death penalty opponents and advocates alike, both sides pointing to Tabler’s case as an example of their arguments. For the families of the victims, the execution brought a measure of closure after two decades of appeals and delays.
Texas remains one of the most active execution states in the nation. Tabler’s death marked one of the first executions in the state in 2025, with multiple additional executions already scheduled in the months ahead.
