LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Arkansas has executed inmate Jack Jones by lethal injection, the first of what would be the only double-execution in the U.S. since 2000.
Jones was pronounced dead at 7:20 p.m. Monday at the state’s Cummins Unit in southeast Arkansas. Barring any last-minute stays, inmate Marcel Williams will be executed later Monday.
Jones was sent to death row for the 1995 rape and killing of Mary Phillips. He was also convicted of attempting to kill Phillips’ 11-year-old daughter and was convicted in another rape and killing in Florida.
Jones said earlier this month that he was ready for execution. Jones used a wheelchair and he’d had a leg amputated in prison because of complications related to diabetes.
Arkansas had scheduled eight executions over an 11-day period before the end of April, when its supply of one lethal injection drug expires. One inmate was put to death last week, though the first three executions were canceled because of court rulings.
The Supreme Court denied the request for a stay from Jones, who argued his poor health would lead to excessive pain during the lethal injection.
He had a leg amputated in prison because of diabetes-related complications, was sentenced to death for the rape and killing of a woman in northern Arkansas.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented from the majority in the decision Monday night.
