Teen endured 90 minutes of terror before her death
| She was just waiting for the bus … Kansas City Star, MO - By TONY RIZZO. Kidnapped at the dawn of a beautiful spring morning a month after she turned 15, Ann Harrison .. |
Posted on 02/02/2006 10:42:30 PM PST by Former Military Chick
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States is taking a new look at the use of lethal injections to execute condemned prisoners after the challenges of three inmates who were barely saved from the needle by the Supreme Court.
The justices will not reopen the cases of Michael Taylor, a rapist and killer who was due to be executed in Missouri on Wednesday, or Clarence Hill and Arthur Rutherford, two convicted killers in Florida who have also had their executions stayed over the past eight days.
But the highest US court will decide whether the three can challenge the use of the deadly mix of sodium thiopental, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride for executions.
Lawyers for Taylor, Hill and Rutherford are all arguing separately that the mix is "cruel" and "inhumane", which would make it proscribed by the US constitution.
John Simon, a lawyer for Taylor, whose victim was a 15-year-old girl, said he was not an abolitionist. He told AFP he was simply arguing that the chemicals could cause added suffering for his client when he is executed.
The Supreme Court halted Taylor's execution after its scheduled time. Hill had been strapped to a stretcher with intravenous tubes in his arm ready to receive the chemicals when word came through from the justices in Washington on January 24.
Stephen Harper, a law professor at the University of Miami, said the new challenges to the lethal injection followed the publication of a study by experts at the university in April last year which described the suffering of death row inmates given the death cocktail.
The researchers said in a letter to the British review, The Lancet, that sodium thiopental, which is used as an anaesthesia, may not work properly.
The pancuronium bromide is given next to induce paralysis, and finally potassium chloride to stop the heart and cause death.
"Without anaesthesia, the condemned person would experience suffocation and excruciating pain without being able to move or communicate that fact," said the study.
Of the 38 US states where the death penalty is still legal, 20 use just the injection and most of the others rely mainly on this form of execution.
More suspensions of death penalties are possible but experts said it does not mean that the lethal injection is seriously threatened yet.
Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes capital punishment, said the Supreme Court will only decide whether the legality of the injections can be raised with lower courts as a civil rights matter.
"It is the first step in at least getting the matter into the court," he said.
"The bigger issue of lethal injection will get decided by many different courts and you may have many different opinions and that issue may come back to the Supreme Court to decide once and for all."
A final decision may take years.
In the meantime, death row inmates in Maryland, California and other states are now trying to get their executions suspended.
But not all of the challenges are working. Last week the Supreme Court voted 6-3 to let Indiana state execute Marvin Bieghler, overturning an appeals court decision clearing the way for him to challenge lethal injection as well.
I read a study somewhere a while back, and it stated that in places where hanging is done properly-long drop, short stop, or something, that it is quick and painless. I think Singapore was one of the places that has it down pat.
Well...I dont know, but I hear starvation and dehydration is positivly euphoric...
And not only allowable, but encouraged here in FL.
They'll die laughing.
"given what these monsters put their victims through, I'd consider it divine intervention if the anesthetic didn't do its thing."
I could not agree more, especially in the case of Taylor. Taylor and his partner kidnapped a 15 year old girl waiting for a school bus, took her to a home of Taylor's mother, raped her repeatedly for 90 minutes and then stabbed her to death with two kitchen knives. Taylor, when he was caught, described in detail and with no remorse, the way she died and how he just stood there and watched it happen. He was telling it just like he watched it in a movie and was not the one who did the horrible act.
This man does not deserve any anesthetic. If it were up to me, the killers would be put to death in the same manner that they killed their victims and preferably over the same time period. But then again, I believe in justice.
The victim MUST have MINMUM success, the perp MUST have MAXIMUM success! The law stands firm!
I'm sure that 15 year old died real nice. /sarcasm
Oh, guess that rules out honey&the ant hive death?
What about a "beautiful death"? No food, nor water for a few weeks? The Dem's have already approved it.
What do they want?.....someone to sing them a lullaby?
The leftists are against the death penalty but are all for doctor assisted suicide. Very well. Have the criminals executed with the same drugs that are advocated for use in suicide. That should put the left in a tizzy as they explain why it isn't "cruel" to kill an elderly person because he is a burden on his family and yet is is cruel to use the same method on a criminal.
So we have some eggheads in south Florida to thank for this delayed justice. Great.
So what? The execution is stayed until the appeal is decided (in other words, a delay). The semantics are irrelevant.
Uh, that's what the trial court is for--determining the facts.
"Just give em an OVERDOSE of sodium thiopental...Keep pumping it in until they-are-dead. Case closed"
You owe me a keyboard - This ones covered in coffee
Their victims didn't get such a cushy deal, now did they?
| She was just waiting for the bus … Kansas City Star, MO - By TONY RIZZO. Kidnapped at the dawn of a beautiful spring morning a month after she turned 15, Ann Harrison .. |
I read the newspaper article in the KC Star today. It broke my heart for her and for the horror her parents went through. The article, to me, was a bit slanted towards not executing the murderers, but the Star is a liberal rag.
It makes me keep a much closer eye on my daughters, although they complain, they know I am doing it for their own good. I pray for her parents and hope that God will give them some comfort and they only remember the good times that they had with her.
"My client is allergic to those chemicals, your Honor. In addition, your Honor, these chemicals have not been approved by the FDA and studies have shown that there are dangerous side effects.."
But no first hand knowledge?
Did someone who drowned come back to tell ya?
I say, if they don't think that the anaesthesia is working, stick 'em with a pin to see if they flinch. No flinch, proceed with the sentence.
S&w 500 to the back of the head, messy but painless
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