OKLAHOMA CITY – Carlos Cuesta Rodriguez was executed by lethal injection Thursday morning at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, bringing a final, silent end to a case that haunted investigators for over two decades. The 70-year-old, pronounced dead at 10:13 a. m.
, offered no final words as the drugs began to flow, a stark contrast to the remorseful statement he delivered to the parole board just one month prior. His execution, carried out for the 2003 murder of Olympia Fiser, marks the culmination of a legal battle that stretched through 23 years of appeals and procedural reviews, ending with the state carrying out its sentence for a crime prosecutors described as one of the most calculated acts of domestic violence they had ever seen.
The silence in the execution chamber was a far cry from the chaos of the early morning hours of May 31, 2003, when Fiser’s life was brutally extinguished. Rodriguez, a Cuban immigrant who arrived during the Mariel boatlift, had a history of violent behavior that was well-documented in court records. His third ex-wife had previously filed for a protection order against him, citing his volatile temper and jealous outbursts.
Yet, despite these warning signs, Fiser had returned to the home they shared in southwest Oklahoma City, a decision that would ultimately seal her fate and leave her adult daughter, Katya, to witness the horrific aftermath of a man’s uncontrollable rage.
The events leading to the murder began to unfold 13 days before the killing when Fiser, bearing visible bruises on her arms and stomach, walked into the Oklahoma City Police Department. She told officers that Rodriguez had beaten her and strangled her with a belt, but her fear of retaliation was so profound that she panicked and left the station before investigators could photograph her injuries. She explicitly stated she did not want him arrested, a choice that gave her just under two weeks of life before Rodriguez, fueled by a bottle of tequila and paranoid suspicions of infidelity, confronted her in their bedroom in the presence of her pregnant daughter.
The attack was swift and devastating. Rodriguez, using a double-barreled . 45-caliber pistol loaded with shotgun shells, fired a point-blank shot into Fiser’s right eye.
The blast did not 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 her instantly. As Katya, then 18 and five months pregnant, grabbed a baseball bat to defend her mother, Rodriguez disarmed her and turned the weapon on her, forcing her to flee the house for safety. Police arrived within two minutes of a 911 call, but they were met with an impenetrable barrier: the home was fitted with metal burglar bars on every door and window, trapping the wounded Fiser inside with her attacker and preventing any immediate rescue.
For eight agonizing minutes, officers outside could hear Fiser screaming and pounding against the bedroom window, fighting for her life as Rodriguez refused to surrender. The first responders were forced to listen helplessly as a second gunshot rang out, abruptly silencing her cries. The medical examiner later testified that Fiser had been shot through both eyes, with the second blast shattering her skull and causing her to choke on her own blood.
The firearms examiner delivered a crucial piece of testimony, noting that the unusual pistol required several sequential steps to fire a second time, proving the final shot was a deliberate choice, not an accidental reflex.
Rodriguez remained barricaded inside the home for three hours before a tactical team breached the door with hydraulic tools. He was arrested without a struggle and later gave statements to detectives, initially claiming the first shot was an accident. However, his own words would undermine his defense when he admitted he acted out of anger, believing Fiser was seeing other men, and explicitly stated he was not acting because he was drunk.
In 2007, an Oklahoma County jury convicted him of first-degree murder, finding the crime especially heinous, atrocious, and cruel, and that he posed a continuing threat to society, a verdict that carried the death penalty.
The subsequent years were marked by a relentless legal fight as defense attorneys argued that trial counsel had failed to present evidence of organic brain damage, PTSD, and a traumatic childhood in Cuba that included a bus accident and electroshock therapy. They painted a picture of a man with borderline personality disorder and a dependency on pain medication, pleading for a life sentence. Despite these appeals, which wound their way through state and federal courts, the conviction and sentence were upheld, with judges consistently ruling that the original trial was fair and the evidence of guilt was overwhelming.
In June 2026, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond urged the Pardon and Parole Board to deny clemency, calling Rodriguez a “violent domestic abuser and murderer” who showed no mercy to his victim. The board heard testimony from Katya, who detailed the lasting trauma of that night, revealing that the sound of a can of biscuits popping open on a Sunday morning still triggers her PTSD. She confronted the board with the reality that Rodriguez could have helped her mother after the first shot but instead waited and fired again, a choice that cemented his fate in the eyes of the board, which voted 3-1 to deny mercy.
At his clemency hearing in July, Rodriguez made a surprising statement, telling the board through a translator that he was not there to ask for anything but to apologize to Olympia’s daughters. He expressed remorse and stated, “It’s time for me to pay for what I did,” explicitly waiving his right to seek mercy. This admission, coupled with the brutal nature of the crime, solidified the board’s decision and cleared the path for Thursday’s execution.
His final meal, requested the night before, consisted of a Cuban sandwich, Rocky Road ice cream, donuts, and water, a last nod to his heritage before his final walk.
Rodriguez’s execution was not an isolated event, as he was one of three men put to death in the United States on August 13th, marking the first time in 16 years that three executions occurred in a single day across different states. The convergence of these events highlights the ongoing national debate over capital punishment, even as states like Oklahoma continue to carry out sentences for the most severe crimes. For the family of Olympia Fiser, the execution brings a measure of closure, but the pain of losing a mother and grandmother in such a violent manner remains an indelible scar.
The state has spoken, and the man who took a mother’s life has paid with his own.