softheart
05-26-2004, 11:26 AM
I can not believe they are going to do this to another human being, this is horrible to allow this to go on..... :angry:
Posted on Mon, May. 24, 2004
JEFFREY COLLINS
Associated Press
COLUMBIA, S.C. -For eight years, South Carolina's electric chair sat in
storage while 22 inmates chose the newer, less dramatic lethal
injection.
But the state has been testing the chair for use on Friday, when it
plans to execute James Neil Tucker, 47, convicted of killing two women
in their homes during robberies in 1992.
Tucker didn't actively choose electrocution. He just didn't ask for
lethal injection, as he could have under a state law that applies to
inmates sent to death row before June 1995. For those condemned after
that, injection is automatic.
Tucker's reasons for going to the chair by default are not known. South
Carolina doesn't allow inmate interviews, and his lawyers have not
returned calls from The Associated Press over the past three weeks.
Prison officials say they are testing the chair just as they test
lethal injection procedures. The execution will be carried out in the
same manner as the tests - an extremely high jolt of current for
several seconds, a pause, and a weaker current for about two minutes.
Tucker was sentenced to death for shooting Rosa Lee "Dolly" Oakley
twice in the head at her Sumter County home and stealing $14 from her
purse.
A week later, Tucker broke into the home of Shannon Mellon. He bound
her hands and feet and took $20 from her purse. Tucker shot Mellon in
the head three times.
Tucker would be the 247th inmate put to death in South Carolina's
electric chair since it was built in 1912, and one of more than 4,200
inmates electrocuted since the chair's invention 120 years ago.
But in recent years, stories about inmates not dying immediately or
being set on fire, along with lawsuits claiming electrocution is cruel
and unusual, have led more states to introduce death by injection.
Nebraska is the only state that still requires electrocution, and only
five other states allow inmates to choose between electrocution and
injection.
"The lethal injection may have its own problems, but it looks very
medicinal. It looks antiseptic. It looks like the person simply goes to
sleep," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty
Information Center, which collects statistics on executions.
Attorney General Henry McMaster has no problem with electrocution
remaining a capital punishment alternative in South Carolina, his
spokesman Trey Walker said.
"The electric chair is a humane punishment for perpetrators of inhumane
crimes," Walker said.
Tucker would be the fourth person executed in South Carolina this year
and the 32nd since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.
Posted on Mon, May. 24, 2004
JEFFREY COLLINS
Associated Press
COLUMBIA, S.C. -For eight years, South Carolina's electric chair sat in
storage while 22 inmates chose the newer, less dramatic lethal
injection.
But the state has been testing the chair for use on Friday, when it
plans to execute James Neil Tucker, 47, convicted of killing two women
in their homes during robberies in 1992.
Tucker didn't actively choose electrocution. He just didn't ask for
lethal injection, as he could have under a state law that applies to
inmates sent to death row before June 1995. For those condemned after
that, injection is automatic.
Tucker's reasons for going to the chair by default are not known. South
Carolina doesn't allow inmate interviews, and his lawyers have not
returned calls from The Associated Press over the past three weeks.
Prison officials say they are testing the chair just as they test
lethal injection procedures. The execution will be carried out in the
same manner as the tests - an extremely high jolt of current for
several seconds, a pause, and a weaker current for about two minutes.
Tucker was sentenced to death for shooting Rosa Lee "Dolly" Oakley
twice in the head at her Sumter County home and stealing $14 from her
purse.
A week later, Tucker broke into the home of Shannon Mellon. He bound
her hands and feet and took $20 from her purse. Tucker shot Mellon in
the head three times.
Tucker would be the 247th inmate put to death in South Carolina's
electric chair since it was built in 1912, and one of more than 4,200
inmates electrocuted since the chair's invention 120 years ago.
But in recent years, stories about inmates not dying immediately or
being set on fire, along with lawsuits claiming electrocution is cruel
and unusual, have led more states to introduce death by injection.
Nebraska is the only state that still requires electrocution, and only
five other states allow inmates to choose between electrocution and
injection.
"The lethal injection may have its own problems, but it looks very
medicinal. It looks antiseptic. It looks like the person simply goes to
sleep," said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty
Information Center, which collects statistics on executions.
Attorney General Henry McMaster has no problem with electrocution
remaining a capital punishment alternative in South Carolina, his
spokesman Trey Walker said.
"The electric chair is a humane punishment for perpetrators of inhumane
crimes," Walker said.
Tucker would be the fourth person executed in South Carolina this year
and the 32nd since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.