A Texas man who unsuccessfully challenged the safety of the state’s lethal injection drugs and raised questions about evidence used to persuade a jury to sentence him to death for killing an elderly woman decades ago was executed late Tuesday.
Jedidiah Murphy, 48, was pronounced dead after an injection at the state penitentiary in Huntsville for the October 2000 fatal shooting of 80-year-old Bertie Lee Cunningham of the Dallas suburb of Garland. Cunningham was killed during a carjacking.
“To the family of the victim, I sincerely apologize for all of it,” Murphy said while strapped to a gurney in the Texas death chamber and after a Christian pastor, his right hand on Murphy’s chest, prayed for the victim’s family, Murphy’s family and friends and the inmate.
“I hope this helps, if possible, give you closure,” Murphy said.
As orbitz said, my comment is mostly about how much of a different person you are at that point.
There is an ethical argument to be had. After such a long time, the more noble purposes of punishment fade out (e.g. protection of society, correction of the offender), and then especially with death penalty, this looks rather barbaric.
But we would need a lot of details for this to be anything but a theoretical exercise, so I did intend to formulate it in a fashion that even if someone thinks eye-for-an-eye is peak morality, they could still be onboard with it.