Death Penalty News

Tommy Arthur Alabama's quest to kill an inmate who spent decades on death row for murder became a high-stakes game of beat the clock after the U.S. Supreme Court finally cleared the way for his execution. Faced with a deluge of last-minute defense appeals and a legal deadline of midnight to execute Tommy Arthur for a 1982 contract killing, officers at Holman prison had to set the final stage for a lethal injection in only 1 hours, 16 minutes after the justices lifted a temporary stay Thursday night. An officer performed a test to determine whether intravenous drugs had rendered Arthur unconscious about 3 minutes before his death warrant expired, saying the inmate's name repeatedly and pinching his arm without a visible response. Color was draining from Arthur's face and his breathing was shallow at best when the clock hit midnight. A doctor pronounced the 75-year-old inmate dead at 12:15 a.m. Friday. Arthur, who had postponed seven previous execution d...

Tommy Arthur (CNN) Alabama executed death row inmate Tommy Arthur early Friday after a lengthy court battle that included multiple lethal injection delays. Arthur, 75, was convicted in the 1982 murder-for-hire of romantic rival Troy Wicker. The inmate, who was nicknamed the "Houdini" of death row because he'd had seven prior execution dates postponed, died by lethal injection at the Holman Correctional Facility at Atmore. The Supreme Court issued a temporary stay Thursday, then lifted it later that night, leading to his execution. "No governor covets the responsibility of weighing the merits of life or death; but it is a burden I accept as part of my pledge to uphold the laws of this state," Gov. Kay Ivey said in a statement. "Three times Tommy Arthur was tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. Each time his case was reviewed thoroughly at every level of both our state and federal courts, and the appellate process has ensured that...

Tommy Arthur 7 times in 16 years Tommy Arthur has had his execution delayed. As he prepares for what could be his final appointment with the death chamber, he tells Ed Pilkington about a grisly - and traumatic - cycle Tommy Arthur is caught in a ghoulish production of Groundhog Day. 7 times over the past 16 years he has been scheduled to be put to death in Alabama, and 7 times the courts have delayed the execution, most recently in November just minutes before he was strapped to the gurney. Now Arthur, 75, finds himself once again caught in this grisly cycle, with only hours to go before his 8th and possibly final appointment with the death chamber. At 6pm on Thursday, barring intervention by Alabama's governor or the courts, he will be pumped with medical drugs until he dies. To come so close to being killed by the state is extraordinary on any occasion, but 8 times? How has he endured repeated execution dates in 2001, 2007, 2008, 2012, 2015, 2016 and now 25 May 2...

Tommy Arthur Tommy Arthur, who was first sentenced to death in 1983, has long imagined what could be his end: time in a so-called death cell, a choice of a last meal, the final telephone calls and then a lethal injection. That end could come Thursday, his eighth execution date in a case that has spanned the tenures of eight Alabama governors, starting with George Wallace. If it does, it will conclude a legal odyssey that quietly became, for death penalty supporters and critics alike, a symbol of the troubles of the capital punishment system in the United States. “It’s one of those cases in which nobody is happy,” said Robert Dunham, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a research group that has voiced concerns about the application of capital punishment. “People who simply want the execution are unhappy because of the passage of time,” he said. “People who oppose the death penalty are unhappy because they don’t want Tommy Arthur executed. Peo...

Tommy Arthur Seven times, Tommy Arthur has escaped death. With his 8th execution date less than a week away, he phoned from an Alabama prison to talk about the increasingly slim chance that his lethal injection will be called off yet again. "Until I take my last breath I'll have hope," Arthur, who has been on death row for almost 35 years, told NBC News on Friday. "I don't know how to quit. I don't know how to give up." He has the paperwork to prove it. Sentenced to death for a 1982 contract killing he insists he didn't commit, Arthur has filed a mountain of challenges, many of them successful - at least in the short run. The U.S. Supreme Court halted his last scheduled execution six months ago but later declined to take up his case. More recent appeals have been rejected, and while Arthur's attorneys are continuing to fight, the prospects for another reprieve are growing dimmer. Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey last month shot down a r...

Alabama's death chamber Before Ronald Bert Smith’s corpse grew cold – following his patently botched execution by lethal injection on December 8, 2016 – authorities in Alabama launched a campaign of obfuscation and misinformation about what happened to him. It began when Prison Commissioner Jeff Dunn, himself a witness to Smith’s execution, protested : “Early in the execution, Smith, with eyes closed, did cough but at no time during the execution was there observational evidence that he suffered.” Dunn not only doth protest too much, Dunn lied. Because if you credit the macabre and unambiguous accounts of the unbiased media witnesses in attendance – not only is there a great deal of “observational evidence” Smith suffered – the publicly available information suggests he suffered a painfully slow, torturous death. Kent Faulk, a reporter for Alabama’s largest media outlet ( al.com ) and a witness to previous state executions, appeared eerily pale and shaken as ...

Tommy Arthur The Alabama Department of Corrections doesn't have to provide documents to lawyers for Alabama death row inmate Tommy Arthur related to the executions of 2 other inmates last year, a judge has ruled. Arthur's attorneys in March filed a request for a writ of mandamus asking a judge order the Alabama Department of Corrections to provide them records related to the executions of Christopher Eugene Brooks on Jan. 21, 2016 and Ronald Bert Smith on Dec. 8. The request was made under the Alabama Open Records Act. The ADOC, according to the motion, had declined their request for execution logs that record the administration of drugs, the performance of a consciousness assessments, the times of death, and all other events relating to the executions. The attorneys also requested autopsy reports that record the cause of death, any evidence of irregularities or potential issues during the executions, and toxicology screens. Arthur's attorneys have contende...

MONTGOMERY — A judge on Monday dismissed a death row inmate’s claim that Alabama improperly allows “unaccountable bureaucrats” to decide how executions are carried out in the state. The ruling came as lawyers for Tommy Arthur urged another judge to force the state to release prison records from recent executions, including one where the inmate coughed for 13 minutes. Arthur is scheduled to be given a lethal injection on May 25 for the 1982 murder-for-hire slaying of Troy Wicker. Investigators said Arthur was having an affair with Wicker’s wife and she paid Arthur $10,000 to kill her husband. Arthur was on a prison work-release program for the slaying of his sister-in-law at the time of Wicker’s killing. Montgomery Circuit Judge Truman Hobbs on Monday dismissed Arthur’s lawsuit claiming Alabama improperly lets the Department of Corrections determine the lethal injection protocol. Hobbs wrote that Arthur waited too late to raise that claim. Arthur’s lawyers argued in a...

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey has been in office less than three weeks and she will soon face a life and death decision. As governor, Ivey has the power to commute the death sentence of an inmate to life or grant a reprieve to delay an execution.  The next one is the execution of Tommy Arthur, which is set for May 25. 14 days later the state also plans to execute Robert Melson, the man convicted in the 1994 slayings of three Popeye's restaurant employees in Gadsden. What will Ivey do? "The Governor is aware of the scheduled execution," Ivey's press secretary, Eileen Jones, stated in an email to AL.com regarding Arthur's execution. "She realized the serious responsibility she has as Governor regarding an execution. She plans to meet with the appropriate authorities to thoroughly review before making a final decision," she stated. Only once since executions were reinstated in Alabama in the early 1980s, after a nation...

Tommy Arthur Attorneys for Alabama Death Row inmate Tommy Arthur can't have access to phones during his execution to call a judge in case they see something go wrong, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. Arthur is set to be executed May 25 at Holman Correctional Facility for the 1982 murder-for-hire slaying of Troy Wicker, of Muscle Shoals. Arthur has had seven previous executions delayed by courts - the last one on Nov. 3 . The U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 21 denied Arthur's request for a review of his appeal claiming the state's lethal injection method of execution is unconstitutional. The next day the Alabama Attorney General's Office asked that a new execution be set for Arthur. Arthur's attorneys are seeking a re-hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court. U.S. District Court Judge Keith Watkins on Wednesday issued an opinion denying Arthur's attorneys request to have access to cell or landline phones in the witness room at the prison during the...