Texas death row inmate executed – 'I'm going home to be with the Lord'
Texas last night executed a man convicted of double murder after his last minute appeals were rejected.
Willie Trottie, 45, was pronounced dead at 6:35 p.m. CDT, 22 minutes after he was given a lethal dose of pentobarbital.
Before being injected, he reportedly asked forgiveness from his witnesses – members of his victims' family and his own – and said: "I love you all.
"I'm going home, going to be with the Lord...find it in your hearts to forgive me. I'm sorry."
Trottie admitted to shooting dead his former common-law wife and her brother at their parent's home in Houston in May 1993, though he claimed it was accidental and in self-defence.
He appealed against his death sentence, arguing in the days leading up to his death that he had received poor legal help during his trial.
His sentence was carried out just 90 minutes after the courts rejected his last-minute appeals, AP reports, making him the eighth prisoner to receive the lethal injection this year in Texas.
He was the second death row inmate to be executed in the US on Wednesday. The lethal injection was also administered to Earl Ringo Jr in Missouri for a double murder and robbery in 1998 just after midnight.
The use of capital punishment in America has faced heightened criticism in recent months following the botched lethal injection of Oklahoma prisoner Clayton Lockett on April 29.
Lockett died of a heart attack 43 minutes after the drugs meant to kill him failed to work due to a collapsed vein and his execution was halted; witnesses say he was writhing on the table and appeared to be in pain during the procedure.
Following Lockett's death, leader of the New Monasticism movement Shane Claiborne, an outspoken staunch opponent of capital punishment, condemned legalised executions as "traumatic" and a way by which to "glorify death".
Ahead of Trottie and Ringo's deaths, he tweeted:
2 executions are scheduled for tomorrow. Willie Trottle in TX. Earl Ringo in MO. Help us Lord. #thecureisasbadasthedisease
— Shane Claiborne (@ShaneClaiborne) September 10, 2014
