Inmate dies in US after botched execution
Print Edition
PRISON officials in Oklahoma, the United States, halted an inmate’s execution on Tuesday after a new drug combination left him writhing and clenching his teeth on the gurney. He later died of a heart attack.
Clayton Lockett, 38, was declared unconscious 10 minutes after the first of three drugs in the state’s new lethal injection combination was administered. Three minutes later, though, he began breathing heavily, writhing, clenching his teeth and straining to lift his head off the pillow.
The blinds were eventually lowered to prevent those in the viewing gallery from watching what was happening in the death chamber, and the state’s top prison official eventually called a halt to the proceedings. Lockett died of a heart attack a short time later, the Department of Corrections said.
“It was a horrible thing to witness. This was totally botched,” said Lockett’s attorney, David Autry.
The execution woes are likely to fuel more debate about the ability of states to administer lethal injections that meet the US Constitution’s requirement they be neither cruel nor unusual punishment.
Republican Governor Mary Fallin ordered a 14-day stay of execution for an inmate who was scheduled to die two hours after Lockett, Charles Warner.
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