The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board on Wednesday recommended clemency for another death row inmate in part because of concerns about the last execution.
"That process is obviously flawed," board member Larry Morris said before voting to recommend clemency.
"We have had individuals on the table suffering for 20 and 30 minutes apiece. And I don't think that any humane society ought to be executing people that way until we figure out how to do it right."
The board voted 3-2 to recommend clemency for convicted murderer Bigler Jobe "Bud" Stouffer II, who claimed he is innocent. Gov. Kevin Stitt has the final say.
The death sentence will be changed to life in prison without the possibility of parole if the governor accepts the recommendation.
Stouffer, 79, is on death row for fatally shooting Putnam City elementary school teacher Linda Reaves on Jan. 24, 1985. His execution is scheduled for Dec. 9.
Parole board members talked at length about the last execution before voting because of media reports the inmate convulsed repeatedly and vomited during the procedure.
John Marion Grant was executed on Oct. 28 after the board denied his clemency request.
Board member Kelly Doyle said she was recommending clemency on mercy grounds.
But she also said Stitt should be involved in death penalty decisions because of the way executions have carried out. In Oklahoma, the governor does not have any say on executions if the board denies clemency.
Board member Richard Smothermon said how the death penalty is implemented is "not our role."
"I share the concerns but I'm not a doctor, and I don't make the law, and I'm not the one that makes those decisions on how that is implemented," the former prosecutor said before voting against recommending clemency.
Board member Scott Williams also expressed concerns about the execution process before voting against the clemency recommendation. "That's something I need a lot more clarity on," he said.
The board chairman, Adam Luck, voted to recommend clemency.
An Oklahoma City federal judge is going to rule on a legal challenge to the lethal injection process after hearing from experts at a trial next year. The trial is set to start Feb. 28.
More than 30 death row inmates are complaining in a lawsuit a sedative used at the start of the process will expose them to excruciating pain in violation of their constitutional rights. Morris said he was dumbfounded the board is having clemency hearings until the trial is over.
An execution was set for Stouffer because he was not part of that legal challenge. He since has filed his own lawsuit and is seeking an execution stay. U.S. District Judge Stephen Friot is to consider his stay request Monday.
The murder victim was dating a homebuilder, Doug Ivens, who was in the middle of a divorce. Stouffer was dating Ivens' estranged wife.
The parole board was told Stouffer came up with a plan to get Ivens out of the way and make it look like a murder-suicide. He shot both Ivens and Reaves and put the gun in the schoolteacher's hand in "one last act of evil," Assistant Attorney General Joshua Fanelli said.
Stouffer was arrested because Ivens survived despite being shot in the face. Ivens crawled to a phone, called 911 and identified Stouffer as the shooter.
"Hurry, hurry," Ivens said in a 911 call played for the board.
The parole board also was told Stouffer tried to hire 2 hitmen from death row to kill Ivens and others. The parole board was told he warned his defense attorney to win at retrial or "I'll have you bumped off."
Stouffer claimed Ivens was the one trying to set him up for Reaves' murder. He claimed the homebuilder was shot during a struggle. He also denied hiring hitmen and said he was joking with the defense attorney.
"I had nothing to do with shooting Linda Reaves," he said. "I believe that I was lured into a crime scene by Doug Ivens … and likely was intended to be another victim."
Attorney General John O'Connor called the parole board's decision disappointing.
"The board’s decision … was improperly based on whether an inmate will suffer pain during an execution," he said. "This concern is not a concern for the Pardon and Parole Board. Instead, it is a concern of the courts. The courts, in declining to grant a stay of execution for other death row inmates, have spoken. The execution of Mr. Stouffer should proceed.
"The decision, however, is now in the hands of the Governor."
Source: oklahoman.com, Staff, November 18, 2021
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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
