"Texas executes man who killed parents at their Lubbock home in 1998," is by Michael Graczyk of the Associated Press, via the Washington Post.
A Texas man was put to death Wednesday evening for killing his parents at their Lubbock home 15 years ago during a drug-influenced rampage that also left his 89-year-old grandmother dead.
Michael Yowell, 43, told witnesses, including his daughters and his ex-wife, that he loved them.
And:
Yowell tried to delay his execution, the 14th this year in the nation’s most active death penalty state, by joining a lawsuit with two other condemned prisoners that challenged Texas prison officials’ recent purchase of a new supply of pentobarbital for his scheduled lethal injection.
The punishment was delayed briefly until the U.S. Supreme Court, in a brief ruling, rejected the appeal.
The prisoners argued use of the sedative could cause unconstitutional pain and suffering because the drug, replacing a similar inventory that expired at the end of September, was made by a compounding pharmacy not subjected to strict federal scrutiny. Texas, like other death penalty states, has turned to compounding pharmacies that custom-make drugs for customers after traditional suppliers declined to sell to prison agencies or bowed to pressure from execution opponents.
The Los Angeles Times reports, "Texas turns to pharmacy for custom-made execution drug," by Molly Hennessy-Fiske.
Texas carried out yet another controversial execution Wednesday.Michael Yowell, 43, was put to death by lethal injection about 7 p.m. for killing his parents at their Lubbock home 15 years ago. The drug-fueled attack also left his 89-year-old grandmother dead.
Yowell was the 14th inmate executed this year in Texas, the country’s most active death penalty state, which has executed more than 500 prisoners.
But Yowell did not die like the others.
Last month, Texas officials were facing a shortage of the drug used in lethal injections, pentobarbital, after the manufacturer announced that the drug was unsafe for use in lethal injections and restricted its sale. Texas had already switched to pentobarbital from another execution drug, sodium thiopental, after a U.S. supplier of the latter halted distribution amid international protests.
So the state did what others have done: turned to a compounding pharmacy, which can custom-make drugs without federal scrutiny.
"Edward Harold Schad Executed: 71-Year-Old Was Oldest Person On Arizona Death Row," is by Bob Christie of AP, via HuffPost.
Arizona on Wednesday executed the oldest person on its death row, nearly 35 years after he was charged with murdering a Bisbee man during a robbery.The execution of 71-year-old Edward Harold Schad Jr. came about two hours after the U.S. Supreme Court denied his final appeals.
At about 10 a.m., the warden at the state prison in Florence read Schad's execution warrant and asked him if he had anything to say.
Schad responded: "Well, after 34 years I'm free to fly away home. Thank you, warden. Those are my last words."
To date there have been 30 executions in American death penalty states this year; a total of 1,350 post-Furman executions since 1977.
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