Richard Leavitt was executed by the State of Idaho for the sexual assault and murder of a woman. According to court documents Richard Leavitt would attack, sexually assault and stab to death Danette Elg. Richard Leavitt would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Richard Leavitt would be executed by lethal injection on June 12 2012
Richard Leavitt More News
Convicted killer Richard Leavitt was calm and spending what was expected to be his last full day alive meeting with his team of lawyers and a handful of approved visitors at his cell on Idaho’s death row, prison officials said Monday.
Leavitt, 53, is scheduled to be put to death this morning by lethal injection at Idaho Maximum Security Institution, south of Boise. He was convicted in 1985 for the brutal stabbing death of Danette Elg, a 31-year-old woman from Blackfoot.
Idaho Press-Tribune reporter John Funk is one of the designated witnesses to the execution.
Leavitt, along with members of his family, insists he didn’t commit the crime. But barring any last-minute reprieve from federal judges, Leavitt will be just the second Idaho inmate put to death in 17 years.
He was calm as he met with visitors and lawyers, state prisons spokesman Jeff Ray said. Leavitt declined to disclose the identity of his approved visitors. Ray said Leavitt will have baked chicken, french fries and milk for his last meal.
Today’s execution will be different in two ways from the execution last November of Paul Ezra Rhoades.
The state’s execution team will administer a single, lethal dose of pentobarbital, a drug used as a surgical sedative. Last fall, Rhoades was given a lethal injection of three chemicals.
If the execution goes forward, it will mark the first time state and media witnesses will view Idaho’s lethal injection process in its entirety. Last fall, witnesses were barred from seeing the execution team escort Rhoades into the chamber, strap him to a gurney and insert the IV catheters into his arms.
Prison officials had blocked that portion of the execution to protect the identity of the execution team members. But more than a dozen news organizations sued the state, alleging that the Idaho Department of Correction policy limiting access to an execution from start to finish violated the First Amendment and the public’s right to know.
The news groups, led by The Associated Press, sought to expand access to bring Idaho policies in line with a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled on a 2002 case that the public has a right to view executions in their entirety. The portion of the execution process blocked by Idaho prison officials has been subject to legal challenges by death row inmates nationwide, claiming the insertion of the catheters can be botched in a way that causes pain, other medical complications and raises questions about the dignity of the process
On Friday, a three-judge panel from the San Francisco-based court sided with the news groups and ordered IDOC to modify its policy.
The same federal appeals court on Monday rejected two requests by Leavitt’s team of lawyers to rehear appeals in his case.
Late Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a motion Leavitt filed seeking a stay of the execution.
