Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Politics, Society

“He Is Still Alive”: Arizona Takes Two Hours To Execute Prisoner

23ARIZONA-now-master180We previously discussed the botched execution in Oklahoma and the questions that it raised about our methods of execution. Now we have another horrific execution story to report. In Arizona, it took almost two hours for the prison to execute Joseph R. Wood III. The execution took so long that his counsel had time to file emergency papers with the federal court saying “He is still alive.”

Wood’s execution was given the green light after the United States Supreme Court overturned a stay of execution that had been granted by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The Ninth Circuit held that the state had to disclose the drugs and the executioners to be used in his lethal injection — a ruling that now seems prophetic though the matter is under investigation. Arizona has disclosed it uses a combination of midazolam and hydromorphone as well as the planned dosages. However, it would not reveal information about the manufacturers and suppliers of the drugs or details about the qualifications of the state prison employees assigned to the execution. The sources of these drugs, as we discussed earlier, have been a major controversy given the international movement to cut off access of U.S. prisons to drugs used in executions.

Wood was seen gasping for breath for more than an hour and a half before he died Wednesday. The execution began at 1:52 p.m., and the inmate was pronounced dead at 3:49 p.m. Witnesses counted over 600 gasps before he finally died. His lawyers rushed to try to get a court to intervene with no success. They filed with both state and federal courts as well as with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy through his clerk’s office.

In their filing to the district court, “He is still alive . . . This execution has violated Mr. Wood’s Eighth Amendment right to be executed in the absence of cruel and unusual punishment. We respectfully request that this court stop the execution and require that the Department of Corrections use the lifesaving provisions required in its protocol.”

Wood was convicted of shooting to death his ex-girlfriend, 29, and her father, 55, in 1989.

Gov. Jan Brewer of Arizona made the following statement:

“While justice was carried out today, I directed the Department of Corrections to conduct a full review of the process,” she said. “One thing is certain, however: Inmate Wood died in a lawful manner, and by eyewitness and medical accounts he did not suffer. This is in stark comparison to the gruesome, vicious suffering that he inflicted on his two victims — and the lifetime of suffering he has caused their family.”

74 thoughts on ““He Is Still Alive”: Arizona Takes Two Hours To Execute Prisoner”

    1. “It eliminates the possibility of redemption.”

      It eliminates the possibility of any kind of correction if the verdict is found to be incorrect.

  5. Paul C.:

    Retributive justice entails a judicial process under rules established by the state. What you are describing is actually revenge, an entirely different concept.

  6. As the comments of its proponents regularly remind us, the death penalty is not a form of measured retributive justice; it is instead an instrument of primitive vengeance.

    1. Mike – if it were retributive justice the victims or families of the victims would be meting out the punishment and it would be a lot harsher.

  8. What does the torture culture have to say about Cameron Willingham who was wrongfully convicted of murdering his three young children by arson at the family home in Corsicana, Texas, on December 23, 1991? An innocent man, he was executed in 2004.

    For all we know, given the profound corruption in the American legal system, Wood was innocent, too.

    Civilized man is about rising above animal instinct, living by a code that is moral. There is a difference between cold-blooded-murder and heat-of-passion murder. Execution is cold blooded murder, no matter how you slice it, and the executioner is not in any heat of passion. If Wood is guilty, how is the executioner any different from him?

  9. saucy, that blow up doll in your closet leaves you as frustrated as ever.

  11. Get the feeling some folks enjoyed those Charles Bronson Death Wish movies a bit too much?

    Step one: Bad guy was a bad, bad, bad guy.

    Step two: We now have the perfect excuse to let our blood lust/torture fantasies loose.

    Step three: Lather, rinse, repeat.

    It’s not about the piece of filth who was executed.

    It’s about our society. Some folks actually want a society where they can feel good about the pleasure they take from torture and suffering. Then there are other people who find those sadists repulsive and feel that lowering ourselves to the level of the bad guy is just that: lowering ourselves.

  16. I have always been opposed to the death penalty but for more philosophical reasons, religious and practical reasons. This is unconscionable and provides more reason why the death penalty needs to be abolished.

  17. “He is still alive . . . This execution has violated Mr. Wood’s Eighth Amendment right to be executed in the absence of cruel and unusual punishment. We respectfully request that this court stop the execution and require that the Department of Corrections use the lifesaving provisions required in its protocol.”
    _____________________________________________________

    So bringing him back from the brink and then killing him again would be less cruel and unusual? I think I’d rather just gasp it out…

  18. A tip for Gov. Jan Brewer

    A crazy murderer who should have had a pastor during those last hours and minutes.
    Sing him to death. Help, I can’t get this song out of my head.

  19. “He was no more aware than someone under anesthesia.”

    Of course we now know that people who have presumed to have been under anesthesia have been immobilized and paralyzed but very aware of the pain. Two hours would be an eternity of torture. And yeah, he’s a bad man, but we are supposedly enlightened and humane.

  20. While I am vehemently opposed to the death penalty, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know how kill someone quickly and painlessly.

    But then there are the Luna’s of the world… (comment at 10:56 am)

    OBL won. He’s laughing from the bottom of the deep blue sea.

    We are not “exceptional.” Not by a long shot.

    Most Americans have absolutely no idea exactly what we’ve become.

Comments are closed.