Missouri executed convicted killer Michael Worthington despite calls for caution after a condemned prisoner took more than an hour to die in an execution in Arizona last month.
The Missouri execution was the first in the United States since the July 23 execution of Joseph Wood, who some witnesses said gasped and struggled for breath for more than 90 minutes as he was put to death at an Arizona state prison complex.
The 43-year-old Worthington was pronounced dead at 12:11 a.m. CDT at a prison facility in Bonne Terre, said Missouri Department of Corrections spokesman Mike O'Connell. He was convicted of murder for the 1995 rape and strangling of a university student in the St. Louis area.
The US Supreme Court on Tuesday denied two stay applications filed by Worthington's attorneys. They had asked the high court to prohibit Missouri from executing Worthington until more scrutiny was given to what happened in Arizona and to secrecy in Missouri about the lethal injection drugs being used.
"It seems like it would be a reasonable request. The Arizona case ... gives us some additional ammunition," said attorney Kent Gibson, who represented Worthington.
Missouri Governor Jay Nixon said that he had denied a clemency petition, calling the rape and murder of 24-year-old Melinda 'Mindy' Griffin a "horrific killing."
"DNA evidence and his possession of items stolen from her home reinforced his confession and guilty pleas to murder, rape and burglary," Nixon said in a statement.
Griffin was finishing her final year of study at the University of Missouri-St. Louis "when her promising life was cut short," state Attorney General Chris Koster said by e-mail.
The complications in putting Wood to death in Arizona came after two other lethal injections went awry earlier this year in Ohio and Oklahoma. The cases have intensified debate over the death penalty in the United States.
The American Civil Liberties Union called on Monday for a national suspension of executions due to what it has called a string of "botched" killings, citing a need for states to provide more transparency and accountability.
Lethal injection drugs have been the subject of mounting controversy and court challenges as many states have started using drugs supplied by lightly regulated compounding pharmacies because traditional suppliers have backed away from the market. Several states, including Missouri, have refused to provide details about where they are getting the drugs.
Missouri said on Tuesday there is no need to suspend executions. The state uses pentobarbital, not the two-chemical combination used in Arizona, and its execution procedure is proper, Koster's office said.
"I'll no longer have to suffer," Worthington said in a final written statement. "It's really my beloved friends and family that will suffer. May God forgive those who call this justice."
Worthington's last meal was a cheeseburger, rib-eye steak, onion rings and French fries, O'Connell said.
Jack Angelbeck, Griffin's parent, said in a statement that Worthington's "quiet, peaceful death" was in "stark contrast to the violent and painful death that Mindy suffered at his hands."
Worthington was one of more than a dozen death row prisoners who are challenging Missouri's lethal injection protocols in a federal lawsuit. A hearing in that case is set for Sept. 9 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in St. Louis.