State executes inmate by lethal injection
12th December 2002
By Todd Kleffman
Montgomery Advertiser
ATMORE -- Alabama used its new method of death Thursday afternoon with the lethal injection execution of Anthony Keith Johnson at Atmore's Holman Correctional Facility.
Johnson, 46, was pronounced dead at 6:27 p.m. after receiving a series of injections that first knocked him out and then stilled his heart.
Prison Commissioner Mike Haley said the execution went "very smoothly."
Witnesses estimated Johnson stopped breathing within five minutes after the first injection was administered.
"His stomach kind of heaved a few times after they gave him the drugs. Otherwise, it was just like he went to sleep," said Garry Mitchell, an Associated Press reporter who watched the execution.
The execution was carried out as scheduled after both the U.S. Supreme Court and Gov. Don Siegelman refused to issue a last-minute stay. Many considered Johnson's death sentence questionable because he did not kill anyone and the judge that sentenced him to death overrode a jury's recommendation of life in prison.
"An immense injustice has been done because of a lack of integrity of our leaders in high places,"said Thomas Elder, Johnson's pastor who witnessed Johnson's death on behalf of his family.
Johnson was convicted of capital murder in the 1984 shooting death of Kenneth Cantrell of Hartselle, in Morgan County in north Alabama.
Cantrell, who ran a jewelry business from his home, was involved in a gunbattle with three men during an attempted robbery. Cantrell was shot five times. Cantrell fired six shots at the robbers, including one that hit Johnson in the back. Johnson was arrested after he showed up at nearby Decatur General Hospital seeking treatment for the wound.
The two other men involved in the robbery were never charged.
"The thing that is heartbreaking about this is that the people involved in this have not been prosecuted -- even though they know who they are and have known who they are for six or seven years," said Elder, pastor of Oak Ridge-Basham United Methodist Church in Hartselle. Along with members of Johnson's family, Morgan County investigators had asked Siegelman to stay the execution.
Elder said Johnson was calm in the days leading up to his death, all the way to the moment he was strapped to the gurney, providing comfort to the many family members and friends who visited.
"Keith made it much easier for us. He reassured us," Elder said. "He was not concerned about Keith. He was concerned about his family."
Johnson had turned to Christianity while in prison, Haley said.
"He was actively involved with prison ministries and they believed he had a geniune spiritual conversion," Haley said.
Johnson was dressed in a white, standard-issue prison uniform and white tennis shoes when he was strapped into the gurney. He exchanged the sign language hand gesture for "I Love You" toward Elder as the death process was started, said Alicia Smith, a reporter for Huntsville television station ABC-31 who was selected to witness the execution.
A prison chaplain knelt beside Johnson as the first chemical was injected and the two seemed to be exchanging prayers, Smith said.
"Keith seemed to be mumbling something and then he just stopped," Smith said. "About five minutes later, you could see death coming over him. The color was gone. It did not seem like he suffered. It seemed like he died in a prayer."
Johnson first received sodium pentothal and then Pavulon to render him unconscious. Finally, a dose of potassium chloride was injected to stop his heart.
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12/13/02 State executes first by injection
KIM CHANDLER News staff writer
ATMORE .... Anthony Keith Johnson, 46, was put to death at 6 p.m. Thursday night, becoming Alabama's first Death Row inmate to be executed by lethal injection. Johnson was executed for his role in the 1984 slaying of Hartselle jeweler Kenneth Cantrell during a robbery attempt. Cantrell was killed in his home after being shot five times in an exchange of gunfire with men who came to his home under the guise of buying gold.
Johnson, strapped to a gray gurney with his arms outstretched and held in place by black straps and orange buckles, was executed in a clinical looking chamber at Holman Correctional Facility. Just before the drugs were administered at 6 p.m., Johnson made the hand sign for "I love you" in the direction of a friend and family pastor, his witnesses. His final statement was to acknowledge his friends and family. "They know I love them," Johnson said. The prison chaplain knelt at the side of the gurney and prayed while Johnson nodded and appeared to mouth words in unison with the prayer until becoming still.
The Alabama Legislature changed Alabama's primary form of execution to lethal injection.
###
ALABAMA:
Johnson executed by lethal injection
With a few deep breaths shortly after 6 p.m. Thursday, Anthony Keith
Johnson became the first Alabama inmate to die by lethal injection.
Johnson, 46, was convicted of capital murder in the 1984 killing of a
Hartselle jeweler, who was shot when robbers entered his home.
Authorities said Johnson was not the triggerman but was injured by the
victim in an exchange of gunfire.
A Morgan County jury convicted Johnson in 1985, recommending he spend
life in prison without parole. A judge overrode that recommendation and
sentenced Johnson to die in the electric chair. Others who took part in
the robbery have never been charged, according to Johnson's pastor, who
witnessed the execution.
"This is an immense injustice," said the Rev. Thomas Elder, pastor of
Oak
Ridge and Basham United Methodist Churches in Hartselle.
Elder said he did not excuse Johnson for his role in the crime, but
"what
happened after is the most wrong." He warned that those who were
involved
in the crime, as well as the officials who allowed the execution to
move
forward, would face judgment themselves one day.
Prison officials said Johnson had remained hopeful most of the day
Thursday that an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and another to Gov.
Don
Siegelman asking for a reprieve would at least postpone the execution,
but both appeals turned down by 4:45 p.m.
5 media witnesses watched the lethal injection. Elder and Johnson's
friend, George Dudley, also witnessed the execution.
At 5:53 p.m., corrections officers opened the curtain to the execution
chamber where Johnson lay strapped to the gurney, intravenous lines
already in place in each arm. He waved at witnesses and smiled.
Warden Grantt Culliver read the death warrant and asked Johnson if he
understood. He said, "It's clear enough, I guess."
When Culliver asked if Johnson had a last statement, Johnson said only
that he wanted to tell his friends and family he loved them, "but they
know I love them."
Johnson smiled at Elder and Dudley, raising his left hand, forefinger,
little finger and thumb extended in the sign language gesture for "I
love
you."
He lay with this head elevated, and at 5:58 closed his eyes, praying
along with the prison chaplain. At 6 p.m., his breathing slowed, he
shook
his head slightly and moved his jaw as his body went limp. His abdomen
constricted several times, and by 6:01 there was no further movement.
At
6:05, the color drained from his face. He lay motionless for nearly 20
minutes before the curtain was closed.
Physicians placed the time of death at 6:27 p.m.
Culliver said the process took a few minutes longer than anticipated,
but
the prison staff took care to avoid problems.
In July, Alabama legislators switched the state's primary means of
execution from electrocution in a chair nicknamed "Yellow Mama" to
lethal
injection. Besides Nebraska, Alabama was the only state left in the
country that still used electrocution as its primary method of
execution.
Johnson was the 1st to be executed in Holman's remodeled death chamber.
"Johnson said he had turned his life over to Christ; he was prepared
for
whatever happened," Culliver said.
Lynda Lyon Block, 54, was executed on May 10. She was the last person
to
die in the state's electric chair when that method of execution was the
only one called for by Alabama law.
Officials said there are 285 inmates on Alabama's death row.
(source: Associated Press)
- Trial Judge Overrode Jury's Recommendation Without Explanation..
###
Lynda Cheryle Lyon:
Executed by the state of Alabama on 10th May 2002.
Lynda Lyon and I corresponded for 7 years before she was sent to the electric chair ( Alabama's infamous 'Yellow Mama' )
I believe that the Governor of Alabama was fulfilling his intention to kill a woman as the last victim of the chair before it became redundant on July 1st 2002.
Lynda wrote the Governor asking for a reprieve (extra time) but he chose to state that she asked for clemency/mercy.
There is a radical difference between the meaning of these two words.
All telephone contact was cut off to and from her a few days prior to her execution and even her husband, George Sibley, was not allowed to call or fax her.
He was transferred away from Holman prison where he was incarcerated on death row and to where she was taken to be killed in the electric chair and so they never got to say goodbye. She was denied a TV interview but eventually after pressure
was applied, she was allowed a telephone interview with WSFA TV.
###
From The Poem "Song Of Myself" by Walt Whitman..
(Words sent to me by one of Colorado's "most dangerous" inmates..)
...I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.
###
Both these people, Keith and Lynda, were Believers, as I am, and so
I know I will meet them in the next phase.
The Death Penalty..
