Alabama inmate who fatally shot man during 1993 robbery is executed

An Alabama inmate convicted of killing a man during a 1993 robbery when he used to be a teen used to be executed Thursday via deadly injection.

Casey McWhorter, 49, used to be pronounced lifeless at 6:56 p.m. at a southwest Alabama jail, government stated. McWhorter used to be convicted of capital homicide and sentenced to dying for his position within the robbery and capturing dying of Edward Lee Williams, 34, on Feb. 18, 1993.

Prosecutors stated McWhorter, who used to be 3 months previous his 18th birthday on the time of the killing, conspired with two more youthful youngsters, together with Williams’ 15-year-old son, to scouse borrow cash and different pieces from Williams’ house after which kill him. The jury that convicted McWhorter really useful a dying sentence via a vote of 10-2, which a pass judgement on, who had the general determination, imposed, in keeping with courtroom information. The more youthful teenagers — Edward Lee Williams Jr. and Daniel Miner, who used to be 16 — have been sentenced to lifestyles in jail, in keeping with courtroom information.

“It’s kind of unfortunate that we had to wait so long for justice to be served, but it’s been served,” the sufferer’s brother, Bert Williams, instructed newshounds after the execution. He added that the deadly injection equipped McWhorter a relaxed dying not like the violent finish his brother persisted.

Prison officers opened the curtain to the execution chamber at 6:30 p.m. McWhorter, who used to be strapped to the gurney with the intravenous traces already connected, moved moderately firstly of the process, rubbing his hands in combination, however his respiring slowed till it used to be not visual.

“I would like to say I love my mother and family,” McWhorter stated in his ultimate phrases. “I would like to say to the victim’s family I’m sorry. I hope you find peace.”

McWhorter extensively utilized his ultimate phrases to take an obvious verbal jab at his executioner, the jail warden who confronted home violence accusations many years in the past, pronouncing that, “it’s not lost on me that a habitual abuser of women is carrying out this procedure.”

Prosecutors stated McWhorter and Miner went to the Williamses’ house with rifles and formed selfmade silencers from a pillow and a milk jug. When the older Williams arrived house and found out the kids, he grabbed the rifle held via Miner. They started to combat over it, and McWhorter fired the primary shot at Williams, in keeping with a abstract of the crime in courtroom filings. Williams used to be shot a complete of eleven occasions.

April Williams, the sufferer’s daughter, stated her father nowadays must be spending time together with his grandchildren and playing retirement.

“There is not a day that goes by that I don’t think about him and how I miss him,” April Williams stated in a observation learn via Corrections Commissioner John Q. Hamm. “Casey McWhorter had several hours in that house to change his mind from taking the life of my Dad.”

Defense legal professionals had unsuccessfully sought a keep from the U.S. Supreme Court, bringing up McWhorter’s age on the time of the crime. They argued the dying sentence used to be unconstitutional as a result of Alabama regulation does no longer believe an individual to be a criminal grownup till age 19.

McWhorter, who referred to as himself a “confused kid” on the time of the slaying, stated he would inspire younger other people going via tough occasions to take a second earlier than creating a life-altering mistake like he did.

“Anything that comes across them that just doesn’t sit well at first, take a few seconds to think that through,” he instructed The Associated Press in an interview final week. “Because one bad choice, one stupid mistake, one dumb decision can alter your life — and those that you care about — forever.” McWhorter maintained that he didn’t intend to kill Williams. Attorney General Steve Marshall stated as Williams used to be at the flooring wounded that McWhorter shot him within the head.

McWhorter spent just about 30 years on Alabama’s dying row, making him a few of the longest-serving inmates of the state’s 165 dying row inmates.

“Edward Lee Williams’ life was taken away from him at the hands of Casey A. McWhorter, and tonight, Mr. McWhorter answered for his actions,” Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey stated in a observation.

The Rev. Jeff Hood, a dying row minister who works with an anti-death penalty team, accompanied McWhorter into the execution chamber as his non secular adviser. “It is not lost on me that he was a murderer and so are all Alabamians tonight. I pray that we will all learn to stop killing each other,” Hood stated in a observation.

The Alabama execution happened the similar evening that Texas executed a man convicted of strangling a 5-year-old woman who used to be taken from a Walmart retailer just about 22 years in the past.

McWhorter used to be the 2d inmate put to dying this 12 months in Alabama after the state paused executions for a number of months to check procedures following a sequence of failed or problematic executions. James Barber, 64, used to be executed via deadly injection in July for the 2001 beating dying of a lady.

Alabama plans in January to make the country’s first try to put an inmate to dying the use of nitrogen gasoline. Nitrogen hypoxia has been licensed as an execution way in Alabama, Oklahoma and Mississippi, however no state has used it.