Texas executes Arturo Diaz

Arturo Diaz

A Texas man who stabbed another man to death when he failed to pay back a $100 debt to an exotic dancer was executed on Thursday.

The execution of Arturo Diaz by lethal injection took place at 6:13 p.m. CT in Huntsville. It is the 13th execution this year in Texas and the 27th in the United States.

Diaz smiled and blew a kiss to several witnesses watching through a window, including his mother and grandmother.

He then turned to the father of his victim, watching through an adjacent window to the death chamber. "I hope this can bring some relief for you and your family," he told him.

Diaz's reaction to the drug was similar to other Texas inmates who have been executed with pentobarbital. He took several deep breaths, began snoring and ceased movement in less than a minute.

He was pronounced dead 17 minutes later, at 6:30 p.m. CDT.

Diaz, 37, was convicted of killing Michael Ryan Nichols in April 1999 in McAllen near the Mexican border, after the 2 spent a night partying with an exotic dancer and friends, according to an account of the incident by the Texas Attorney General's Office.

During the course of the evening, Nichols borrowed $100 from the dancer, who returned the following night to collect her money, the account said.

When Nichols gave her only $50, Diaz arrived with an accomplice, Joe Cordova, who held Nichols while Diaz stabbed him, the account said.

A witness who helped the 2 men throw away a trash bag that contained Nichols' bloody clothes said he heard them talking about a murder Diaz had committed with Cordova's help.

A psychologist testified during Diaz's trial that he had suffered head trauma as a result of being knocked unconscious during fights and having been in a car accident, all of which could "impair his ability to control and regulate his judgment and perceive reality," according to the official account.

The psychologist also testified that Diaz has a low-average intelligence, the verbal ability of an 11-year-old, and a history of anti-social behavior as a child, according to the account.

Diaz was sentenced to death, and Cordova to life in prison, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice website.

Diaz was executed using the drug pentobarbital. In August, Texas officials said the state's supply of the drug would run out this month.

But asked this week about how much pentobarbital the state has on hand, a spokesman would only say that the Texas prison system would be using the drug for the foreseeable future.

"We have not changed our current execution protocol and have no immediate plans to do so," said Jason Clark, spokesman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. Clark did not explain what had changed since August.

Texas switched to pentobarbital, a barbiturate that is the drug of choice for physician-assisted suicide in Europe, when the state had to change drugs after the maker of sodium thiopental, Hospira Inc, stopped manufacturing it.

Denmark's Lundbeck LLC, which makes pentobarbital, has objected to its use in executions, leaving it in short supply as well.

Several states have reported running low on pentobarbital and some have halted executions while they seek access or resolve other lethal injection issues, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.

A request from Diaz to stay the execution was denied on Wednesday by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the Texas attorney general's office said.

Diaz's attorney, James Terry Jr., focused his court appeals to block the punishment on what he argued was previous shoddy legal help at Diaz's trial and early in the appeals process, rather than the drug issue.

In his appeals, Terry argued recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings should allow him to raise previously unsuccessful challenges that Diaz's trial lawyers were deficient for not fully explaining a plea deal offered by Hidalgo County prosecutors. He also argued that attorneys never reached out to Diaz's relatives to testify about his unstable childhood.

Court records show Diaz's relatives didn't want to testify and Diaz didn't want them to testify. Terry also contended Diaz's initial appeals attorney was equally deficient.

Arturo Diaz, who was tonight executed by the State of Texas, met his 8-month-old grandson for the first time Tuesday.

The two encountered each other through the plexiglass of a visitation booth on death row in Livingston, as depicted in this snapshot (right).

Diaz becomes the 13th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Texas and the 505th overall since the state resumed capital punishment on December 7, 1982. Diaz becomes the 266th condemned inmate to be put to death in Texas since Rick Perry became governor in 2001.

Diaz becomes the 27th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1347th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977.

Sources: Reuters, AP, Execution Watch, Rick Halperin, September 26, 2013

Florida executes Michael Tanzi

Florida on Tuesday executed a death row inmate described by one local detective as a "fledgling serial killer" for the murder of a beloved Miami Herald employee. Florida executed Michael Tanzi on Tuesday, 25 years after the murder of beloved Miami Herald employee Janet Acosta, who was attacked in broad daylight on her lunch break in 2000. Michael Tanzi, 48, was executed by lethal injection at the Florida State Prison in Raiford and pronounced dead at 6:12 p.m. ET.

South Carolina | Man who ambushed off-duty cop to face firing squad in second execution of its kind

Mikal Mahdi, 48, who was found guilty of killing an off-duty police officer and a convenience store worker, is the second inmate scheduled to executed by South Carolina's new firing squad A murderer who ambushed and shot an off duty police officer eight times before burning his body in a killing spree is set to become the second person to die by firing squad. South Carolina's highest court has rejected the last major appeal from Mikal Mahdi, 41, who is to be put to death with three bullets to the heart at 6pm on April 11 at the Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia. Mahdi's lawyers said his original lawyers put on a shallow case trying to spare his life that didn't call on relatives, teachers or people who knew him and ignored the impact of weeks spent in solitary confinement in prison as a teen.

Lethal Injection, Electric Chair, or Firing Squad? An Inhumane Decision for Death Row Prisoners

South Carolina resumed executions with the firing squad killing of Brad Sigmon last month. Mikal Madhi’s execution date is days away. The curtain shrieked as it was yanked open to reveal a 67-year-old man tied to a chair. His arms were pulled uncomfortably behind his back. The red bull’s-eye target on his chest rose and fell as he desperately attempted to still his breathing. The man, Brad Sigmon, smiled at his attorney, Bo King, seated in the front row before guards placed a black bag over his head. King said Sigmon appeared to be trying his best to put on a brave face for those who had come to bear witness.

Afghanistan | Four men publicly executed by Taliban with relatives of victims shooting them 'six or seven times' at sport stadium

Four men have been publicly executed by the Taliban, with relatives of their victims shooting them several times in front of spectators at a sport stadium. Two men were shot around six to seven times by a male relative of the victims in front of spectators in Qala-i-Naw, the centre of Afghanistan's Badghis province, witnesses told an AFP journalist in the city. The men had been 'sentenced to retaliatory punishment' for shooting other men, after their cases were 'examined very precisely and repeatedly', the statement said. 'The families of the victims were offered amnesty and peace but they refused.'

South Carolina executes Mikal Mahdi

Mikal Mahdi, 42, was executed for the 2004 murder of 56-year-old James Myers A man facing the death penalty for committing two murders was executed by firing squad on Friday, the second such execution in the US state of South Carolina this year. Mikal Mahdi, 42, was executed for the 2004 murder of 56-year-old James Myers, an off-duty police officer, and the murder of a convenience store employee three days earlier. According to a statement from the prison, "the execution was performed by a three-person firing squad at 6:01 pm (2201 GMT)," with Mahdi pronounced dead four minutes later.

Louisiana | Lawyers of Jessie Hoffman speak about their final moments before execution

As Louisiana prepared its first execution in 15 years, a team of lawyers from Loyola Law were working to save Jessie Hoffman’s life. “I was a young lawyer three years out of law school, and Jessie was almost finished with his appeals at that time, and my boss told me we needed to file something for Jessie because he’s in danger of being executed,” Kappel said. Kappel and her boss came up with a civil lawsuit to file that said since they wouldn’t give him a protocol for his execution, he was being deprived of due process, and the lawsuit was in the legal process for the next 10 years.

USA | Why the firing squad may be making a comeback

South Carolina plans to execute Mikal Mahdi on Friday for the murder of a police officer, draping a hood over his head and firing three bullets into his heart. The choice to die by firing squad – rather than lethal injection or the electric chair – was Mahdi’s own, his attorney said last month: “Faced with barbaric and inhumane choices, Mikal Mahdi has chosen the lesser of three evils.” If it proceeds, Mahdi’s execution would be the latest in a recent string of events that have put the spotlight on the firing squad as a handful of US death penalty states explore alternatives to lethal injection, by far the nation’s dominant execution method.

Arizona | The cruelty of isolation: There’s nothing ‘humane’ about how we treat the condemned

On March 19, I served as a witness to the execution of a man named Aaron Gunches, Arizona’s first since 2022. During his time on death row, he begged for death and was ultimately granted what is likely more appropriately described as an emotionless state-assisted suicide. This experience has profoundly impacted me, leading to deep reflection on the nature of death, humanity, and the role we play in our final moments. When someone is in the end stages of life, we talk about hospice care, comfort, care, easing suffering and humane death. We strive for a “good death” — a peaceful transition. I’ve seen good ones, and I’ve seen bad, unplanned ones.

I spent 16 years in solitary in South Carolina. This is what it did to me. | Opinion

South Carolinian Randy Poindexter writes about the effects 16 years of solitary confinement had on him ahead of South Carolina’s planned execution of Mikal Mahdi , who spent months in solitary as a young man. For 16 years, I lived in a concrete cell. Twenty-three hours a day, every day, for more than 3,000 days, South Carolina kept me in solitary confinement. I was a young man before I was sent to solitary — angry, untreated and unwell. I made mistakes. But I wasn’t sentenced to madness. That’s what solitary did to me. My mental health worsened with each passing day. At first, paranoia and depression set in. Then, hallucinations and self-mutilation. I talked to people who weren’t there. I cut myself to feel something besides despair. I could do nothing as four of my friends and fellow prisoners took their own lives rather than endure another day of torturous isolation.

Execution date set for prisoner transferred to Oklahoma to face death penalty

An inmate who was transferred to Oklahoma last month to face the death penalty now has an execution date. George John Hanson, also known as John Fitzgerald Hanson, is scheduled to die on June 12 for the 1999 murder of 77-year-old Mary Bowles. The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals on Tuesday set the execution date. The state’s Pardon and Parole Board has a tentative date of May 7 for Hanson’s clemency hearing, executive director Tom Bates said.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog