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Missouri executes John Winfield for 1996 double murder (VIDEO)

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Missouri has carried out the execution of 46-year-old John Winfield for the murders of two women in St. Louis County 18 years ago. Winfield received a lethal injection of pentobarbital at 12:01 Wednesday morning and was pronounced dead at 12:10.

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Winfield appeared to tell the witnesses that were there for him, “I love you,” after the curtains were opened to the execution chamber. After the 5 grams of the drug was administered, Winfield took a series of deep breaths and then stopped moving. The execution appeared to take less than a minute.

Winfield declined to make a final statement and did not accept food prior to the execution. His body was released to one of his attorneys.

The execution was witnessed by five members of the family of one of the women he killed, Shawnee Murphy, as well as his ex-girlfriend Carmelita Donald whom he shot four times leaving her blind, three members of her family, his mother, his daughter, and two of his friends. There were no representatives present of the other woman he fatally shot, Arthea Sanders.

Winfield is the seventh man executed in Missouri since November, and the seventh since the state began using pentobarbital compounded by a pharmacy that the Department of Corrections will not officially confirm the identity of.

Missouri Department of Corrections spokesman Mike O’Connell offers the timeline of the John Winfield execution.

Winfield’s execution proceeded after the United States Supreme Court declined two applications for stays filed by his attorneys. One asked for a stay until the resolution of an appeal Winfield had pending in the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals related to Missouri’s execution protocol. The other had asked the Court to stay his execution while it reviewed the 8th Circuit Court’s records and considered his argument that consideration of his petition for clemency was interfered with by Department of Corrections officials.

A short time later, Governor Jay Nixon (D) denied Winfield’s petition for clemency.

In a statement, Nixon wrote, “John Winfield’s violent rampage on the night of Sept. 9, 1996, left two women dead and another permanently blinded. The two murder victims, Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, were killed while trying to help Carmelita Donald escape from the armed Winfield. Carmelita Donald herself was shot and permanently blinded by Winfield, who showed no mercy that night on his victims. The jury in this case properly found that these heinous crimes warranted the death penalty, and my denial of clemency upholds the jury’s decision.

“I ask that the people of Missouri remember the victims of John Winfield, both those who were killed and those who survived, and keep them and their families in their thoughts and prayers.”

After the execution was carried out, Attorney General Chris Koster also issued a statement. He writes, “Nearly two decades have passed since John Winfield’s cowardly acts of rage and jealously changed the lives of three families forever. He brutally murdered two defenseless young women, one in front of her children, and attempted to murder the mother of his own children, leaving her permanently disabled. For his actions, a court lawfully sentenced him to death under Missouri law, and tonight that sentence has been carried out.”

Ahead of Winfield’s lethal injection, Missouri was again the subject of national attention for its executions. It was one of three executions scheduled to take place within 24 hours of one another from Tuesday to Wednesday evening. It became the second execution since one widely regarded as “botched” in Oklahoma; that of Clayton Lockett in April.

An independent autopsy has revealed that the execution team there failed to set a properly functioning intravenous tube in Lockett’s leg. He died of a heart attack 43 minutes after the first drugs were administered.

A condemned Georgia inmate, Marcus Wellons, was executed late Tuesday night by lethal injection for the 1989 rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl. In Florida, John Ruthell Henry is scheduled to be executed Wednesday evening for murdering his wife in 1985.

 

Appeals court maintains stay in Winfield execution

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A three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to overturn a stay of execution for condemned inmate John Winfield, who is scheduled to be executed just after midnight tonight.

A federal judge issued the stay Friday based on arguments that Corrections Department Officials pressured a worker at the prison where Winfield was held not to write a letter in support of clemency for Winfield. The Attorney General’s Office argues that point is moot because Governor Jay Nixon (D), who decides whether clemency is granted, has received a copy of a letter of support from that worker.

The Attorney General has appealed for a hearing before the full 8th Circuit Court.

An application for a stay made by Winfield’s attorneys to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito is still pending.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy.

Earlier stories on John Winfield

Winfield attorneys seek stay from U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice

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Attorneys for convicted murderer John Winfield have asked U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito to issue a stay in Winfield’s execution, scheduled for early Wednesday morning at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center at Bonne Terre.

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

A stay issued last week by a federal judge in St. Louis is still in place.

His attorneys ask Justice Alito to halt the execution until his appeal filed in a case brought by several condemned Missouri inmates is resolved. That is pending in the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, which has declined to stay the execution in light of it.

Justice Alito has issued stays in other recent executions scheduled in Missouri, including that of inmate Russell Bucklew, which last month was halted by the full Court after Alito’s action.

See Winfield’s attorneys’ filing with the US Supreme Court (pdf)

See the Missouri Attorney General’s Office’s response (pdf)

Winfield’s attorneys say a lower court agreed with their arguments that Winfield faces a risk of being harmed by Missouri’s use of pentobarbital that is unregulated by the Food and Drug Administration, provided by an unknown maker, of unknown composition, and made through an unknown process, but the court dismissed his claim because Winfield and the other prisoners did not point to a comparatively safer method of execution.

They also argue that the state’s method of execution could cause Winfield “serious illness and needless suffering.” They point to the halting of the Bucklew execution as an acknowledgement by the Supreme Court of hazards posed by Missouri’s execution method.

The Attorney General’s Office responds to the request for a stay by saying Winfield’s pending appeal does not entitle him to a stay of execution, based on prior rulings.

It responds to the argument that Winfield might suffer by noting Missouri has carried out six executions using pentobarbital and more than 120 witnesses have reported nothing to suggest that those were not quick and painless. It says nothing has changed since the Supreme Court denied stays in those six cases regarding the existence of a more humane form of execution.

Of the Bucklew reference, the Attorney General’s Office says the halting of his execution was based on his health problems, which Winfield does not suffer from.

U.S. District Judge Catherine D. Perry last week issued a stay of Winfields’s execution based on concerns that Department of Corrections officials interfered with the clemency process.  The Attorney General’s Office has asked for that order to be changed.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, friends of his then-girlfriend, Carmelita Donald, whom he also shot, rendering her blind.

UPDATE: Attorney General asks federal judge to change order halting next week’s execution

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The Attorney General’s Office has filed its response to the stay of execution issued for convicted inmate John Winfield, who is scheduled to be executed Wednesday.

A federal judge on Thursday issued the stay citing concerns that Department of Corrections officials interfered with the clemency process. Winfield’s attorneys say a Corrections employee was pressured not to write a letter in support of their request for clemency for Winfield.

Attorney General Chris Koster argues that the claim is moot because a copy of the employee’s letter in support of Winfield is available in public record and media reports. He says Winfield’s attorneys failed to prove that the Governor’s Office had no knowledge of the employee’s statement.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy. They were friends of his ex-girlfriend, whom he also shot and rendered blind.

See earlier story

Stay issued in execution scheduled for next week cites concern of interference in clemency process

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A federal judge has issued a stay in the execution of condemned inmate John Winfield, which is scheduled to take place next week. U.S. District Judge Catherine D. Perry cites concerns that Department of Corrections officials interfered with the clemency process.

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

Lawyers for Winfield say Corrections officials pressured an employee of the prison at Potosi not to write a letter in support of a request for clemency for Winfield. The employee informed his superiors that he had been approached by an attorney for Winfield regarding the clemency proceeding and learned the next day that he was under investigation by the Corrections Department’s Investigator General’s Office for “over-familiarity” with Winfield.

Judge Perry’s order staying next week’s execution also instructs Corrections officials and staff including Director George Lombardi and the wardens of the prisons at Bonne Terre and Potosi not to interfere with corrections employees’ providing of statements in support of clemency for Winfield.

Winfield was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, friends of his ex-girlfriend.

Hearing set for convicted murderer whose execution was halted in May

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A hearing date of September 9 has been set for the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals to hear arguments in the case of a convicted Missouri inmate whose execution was halted last month.

Russell Bucklew (courtesy, Missouri Department of Corrections)

Russell Bucklew (courtesy, Missouri Department of Corrections)

The U.S. Supreme Court wants the Appeals Court to hear the claims by attorneys for 46-year-old Russell E. Bucklew that he has a medical condition that could result in suffering if he undergoes a lethal injection, which would violate constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment.

Bucklew has a condition known as cavernous hemangioma that results in malformed blood vessels. His attorneys argue that could cause, among other things, a painful or prolonged lethal injection.

Attorney Cheryl Pilate says the potential for suffering is greater because of Missouri’s policy of secrecy regarding its execution procedures and drugs.

“A protocol in which virtually nothing is known about either the drug itself or its safety or where it came from or how certain things are going to be done during the execution,” says Pilate. “The secrecy is a factor that is common to all these executions that we’ve seen carried out in Missouri but because of Mr. Bucklew’s unique medical condition, we believe the risks to him were heightened.”

Pilate says it would be inappropriate to speculate about the outcome of her client’s case, but notes that if the state is prevented from giving him a lethal injection, it is unclear how Missouri might proceed. State law only allows for executions to be carried out by lethal injection or lethal gas.

“It’s my understanding the state is not prepared to proceed with lethal gas, so it would appear that absent some other kind of statutory authorization that there would not be other options,” says Pilate.

Bucklew was sentenced to death in 1997 for fatally shooting Michael Sanders in Cape Girardeau County. Bucklew believed Sanders to be his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend. Bucklew then kidnapped and raped his ex-girlfriend before getting involved in a gunfight with authorities that left him and a Missouri State Highway Patrol trooper wounded.

Missouri is scheduled to carry out early Wednesday morning the lethal injection execution of John Winfield for the murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, friends of his ex-girlfriend.

Execution date set for John Winfield, convicted of murders of two

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John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

John Winfield (courtesy; Missouri Department of Corrections)

The State Supreme Court has set an execution date for condemned inmate John Winfield, who was sentenced to death for the 1996 murders of Arthea Sanders and Shawnee Murphy, friends of his ex-girlfriend. He is scheduled to die by lethal injection June 18 at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center at Bonne Terre.

Winfield, 46, learned that his ex had started a new relationship and after confronting her about it, shot her and her two friends. His ex-girlfriend survived by was permanently blinded.

The state is next scheduled to execute Russell Bucklew on May 21.