Michael Worthington was executed by the State of Missouri for the sexual assault and murder of a woman in 1995. According to court documents Michael Worthington would go over to the victims home where he would sexually assault and murder Melinda Griffin. Michael Worthington would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Michael Worthington would be executed by lethal injection on August 5, 2014
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A Missouri inmate was put to death early on Wednesday for raping and killing a neighbor in 1995 – the first lethal injection in the US since an Arizona execution went wrong in July.
The Missouri corrections department said Michael Worthington was pronounced dead shortly after midnight. He was the seventh Missouri inmate executed in 2014 and had been sentenced to death for the 1995 attack on Melinda “Mindy” Griffin during a burglary of her home.
The US supreme court and Missouri’s governor on Tuesday declined to block the execution. Worthington’s attorneys had cited the Arizona execution and two others that were botched in Ohio and Oklahoma, along with the secrecy surrounding the lethal injection drugs used in Missouri.
Worthington, 43, said in a telephone interview with the Associated Press that he had accepted his fate. “I figure I’ll wake up in a better place tomorrow,” Worthington said on Tuesday. “I’m just accepting of whatever’s going to happen because I have no choice. The courts don’t seem to care about what’s right or wrong any more.”
Three problematic executions in recent months have renewed the debate over lethal injection. In Arizona the inmate gasped more than 600 times and took nearly two hours to die. In April an Oklahoma inmate died of an apparent heart attack 43 minutes after his execution began. In January an Ohio inmate snorted and gasped for 26 minutes before being declared dead.
Most lethal injections take effect in a fraction of that time, often within 10 or 15 minutes.
Arizona, Oklahoma and Ohio all use midazolam, a drug more commonly given to help patients relax before surgery. In executions it is one of two or three drugs used in combination.
Texas and Missouri instead administer a single large dose of pentobarbital, often used to treat convulsions and seizures and to euthanize animals.
States have found it harder to obtain lethal injection drugs after European drug companies objected to the use of their products in executions. Missouri and Texas have turned to compounding pharmacies to make versions of pentobarbital. Like most states they refuse to name their drug suppliers, creating a shroud of secrecy that has prompted lawsuits.
On Tuesday Griffin’s 76-year-old parents anticipated witnessing Worthington die. “It’s been 19 years and I feel like there’s going to be a finality,” Griffin’s mother, Carol Angelbeck, told the Associated Press.
Worthington, when asked what he would say to Griffin’s parents, directed his comments to her mother. “If my life would bring her peace and bring Mindy back, I’d be fine with that. But it won’t,” he said. “It doesn’t bring peace or closure. She’s still going to have her broken heart.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/06/missouri-executes-michael-worthington
