Execution Report: Blaine Milam

Blaine Keith Milam, 35, was executed by lethal injection on 25 September 2025 in Huntsville, Texas for the murder of a 13-month-old baby.

On Tuesday, 2 December 2008 at 10:37 a.m., Milam, then 18, dialed 9-1-1 and said, "My name is Blaine Milam, and my daughter, I just found her dead." Sergeant Kevin Roy of the Rusk County Sheriff's Department arrived twenty minutes later at Milam's trailer home outside Tatum, about 15 miles southeast of Longview in east Texas. Two ambulances were already there. EMTs were standing in the doorway of the master bedroom, where Milam and Jesseca Carson, also 18, were kneeling on the floor. Sgt. Roy saw "an infant laying on the floor, not moving, bruised. The baby was laying on its back, and the face of the baby was just one large bruise."

Roy and lead investigator Sergeant Amber Rogers, who arrived later, spoke with Milam and Carson individually. Milam told Roy that he and Carson had left the baby girl, Amora, alone in the trailer and walked up the road to meet a man named Clark who was going to clear some land for them. They returned about an hour later and found "the baby in that condition."

A bit later, Texas Ranger Kenny Ray arrived. He conducted an hour-long interview with Milam in the front seat of his patrol car. Milam told Ray that Carson was his fiancee and that Amora was her daughter. He said they lived together and were raising the baby together. He told Ranger Ray the same story he had told Sgt. Roy but added that when he and Carson came home, they found Amora, not in her crib, but in a hole in the floor of the bathroom that he was remodeling. He said she had a blood ring around her mouth and "it looked like she had been biting the insulation." He initially said Amora was still breathing when he called 9-1-1. He later said that Carson called 9-1-1 while they were looking for Amora and that when they found her, she was dead. Milam denied any involvement in Amora's death and said authorities were "more than welcome" to search his car and home.

At some point during the interview, Ray told Milam he knew he was lying and that most people would suspect that he, as the only male in the house, beat Amora to death. Milam again denied any involvement in her death and offered to take a polygraph test. Ray then ended the interview.

Ranger Ray also interviewed Carson. She did not testify at Milam's trial, so her testimony was not admitted as evidence, but it was summarized in newspaper reports. Carson reportedly told Milam that her baby suffered from demonic possession, and he performed an exorcism to get the demons out.

Shane and Dwight Clark of Clark Timber in Longview denied meeting with Milam on 2 December.

Surveillance video showed Milam and Carson in a pawn shop in Henderson, pawning a chainsaw and air hammer, on the morning of the killing. They were reportedly trying to raise money to pay a priest to perform an exorcism.

Evidence also showed that Milam called his sister, Teresa Shea, before 9:30 a.m., crying and saying that he had "found Amora dead." Shea urged him to call 9-1-1, which he did not do until 10:37.

On 11 December, investigators conducted a second search of the couple's trailer. This investigation found blood spatter and stains on items found near the south bedroom, including some diapers and wipes and a tube of sex lubricant. DNA testing later showed that the blood was Amora's.

On 13 December, Teresa Shea's aunt called Sgt. Rogers and told her that she ought to go to the trailer "immediately." She said that Shea visited Milam in jail that day and after that visit, Shea told her she needed to find a way to get back out to the trailer "to get some evidence out from underneath of it." Rogers immediately obtained a search warrant, crawled under the trailer, and discovered a pipe wrench inside a clear plastic bag. The wrench had been shoved through a hole in the floor of the master bathroom. Forensic analysis on the wrench found components of the diaper Amora had been wearing, sex lubricant, and the blood-stained diapers and wipes found in the south bedroom.

Blaine's trial was moved to Montgomery County because of potentially prejudicial pretrial publicity.

The medical examiner testified that Amora's death was a homicide and that she died from multiple blunt-force injuries and possible strangulation. Her injuries included facial abrasions and bruises; twenty-four human bite marks; bruises, scrapes, and abrasions from head to toe; bleeding underneath the scalp; extensive fracturing to the back of the skull; internal bleeding in the skull, eyes, and neck; eighteen rib fractures; a tear to the liver; and extensive injury to the genitals. There were no old injuries suggesting a pattern of abuse.

Dr. Robert Williams, a forensic odontologist, compared the bite marks found on Amora's body with bite dentition models taken from Milam, Carson, and Milam's brother, Danny. Williams testified that Milam was a match for 8 of the bite marks found on Amora. He excluded Carson from all but one of the marks and Danny from all but one.

Shirley Broyles, the nurse at the Rusk County Jail, testified that Milam called her one day in January. She found him crying in his cell. He handed her a written request to talk to Sgt. Rogers and told Broyles, "I'm going to confess. I did it. But Ms. Shirley, the Blaine you know did not do this. My dad told me to be a man, and I've been reading my Bible. Please tell Jesseca I love her."

The state also offered evidence showing that at the time of Amora's killing, he was on probation. He had entered the home of an 11-year-old neighbor and left a stack of pages torn from pornographic magazines, marked with salacious notes, in her dresser drawer. His probation order barred him from any contact with children outside his own family.

A toxicologist testified that Milam had 0.17 milligrams of methamphetamine in his sytem on the day of the killing and that this was 10 times the therapeutic dose.

Dr. Mark Cunningham, a clinical psychologist, testified that he interviewed Milam three times for a total of nearly ten hours, and he also interviewed his mother and sisters. He concluded that Milam suffered from mental deficiency, meth dependence, and meth psychosis. He testified that Milam's father's death was very upsetting to him. Other witnesses described him as suicidal after his father's death.

The defense focused on implicating Jesseca Carson as the murderer. Carson's mother, Heather Carson, testified that Carson and Milam started dating around January 2008 and got engaged a few months later. Carson subsequently turned 18 and received an insurance settlement from her father's death, which happened in 2001. At that time, Heather testified, Carson immediately became withdrawn, stopped caring about her appearance, and began making serious and unfounded allegations against her.

Lisa Taylor testified that her daughter and Carson were best friends while growing up in Alabama. Carson, Milam, and Amora visited them twice in Alabama in the fall of 2008. Taylor said that Carson made "bizarre" accusations about her mother. She also said that Carson did not take care of Amora and did not give her a bath for a whole week. She described her as "weird," "hollow," and "empty" and said that looking into her eyes was "like looking into a dark space." Taylor testified that Carson was in charge and that when she told Milam to do something, he did it.

A psychiatrist, Dr. Frank Murphy, testified that he did not interview Carson, but based on interviews and other materials he read, she suffered from psychotic depression.

The state presented two witnesses who characterized Milam as dominant in the couple's relationship. One was his former boss, who testified that Milam had "control issues" and he had once warned Milam that if he kept controlling Carson the way he did, she would leave him.

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