Racism, horrific errors and denial of rights... America’s 48-hour execution spree

Josh Marcus reports on how US states are killing inhumanely

- Josh Marcus

On a cold morning last Wednesday, in the execution chamber at the Eyman prison in Florence, Arizona, a 76-year-old named Murray Hooper, convicted of a 1980 double murder, lay strapped to a gurney, awaiting lethal injection.

Officials failed multiple times to place an IV that would deliver the execution drugs, resorting to placing a catheter in the man’s femoral artery, near his groin. He turned towards the gallery, looked at the witnesses on the other side of the glass, and reportedly said, Can you believe this?” before being pronounced dead at 10.34am.

Even for the US, one of few countries that still uses the death penalty, last week was exceptionally violent, with four executions planned in the span of 48 hours. The killings were marred with errors, accusations of racism and discrimination, and claims of innocence. One was called off after officials took more than an hour and were unable to place an IV line.

In Texas on Wednesday, Stephen Barbee, 55, was executed, after being convicted of the February 2005 killing of his pregnant ex-girlfriend and her young son. It took 90 minutes for officials find a vein to deliver the lethal drugs. Barbee’s lawyers said the state wasn’t properly following a March Supreme Court decision requiring that states respect the requests of the condemned to have faith leaders with them in the execution room.

“The recent spate of botched lethal injection executions have shown that, whatever the drug, whatever the protocol, condemned prisoners often spend their final moments in agonising pain and distress,” Maya Foa, director of advocacy group Reprieve US, said in a statement after the execution.