An Oklahoma man was executed Thursday at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, Oklahoma, marking the country’s first execution of the year.
Donald Grant, 46, was declared dead at 10:16 a.m. local time after receiving a lethal injection with no complications, according to Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor. He was convicted of brutally killing two hotel workers in 2001.
“Justice is now served for Brenda McElyea, Felecia Suzette Smith, and the people of Oklahoma,” O’Connor said, according to the Independent.
Grant admitted to the deaths of Smith and McElyea in a hotel robbery in a clemency hearing in November when he apologized for the murders.
“I can’t change that,” Grant said at the time, according to the Associated Press. “If I could, I would. But I can’t change that.”
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According to prosecutors, both women begged for their lives before being shot and stabbed. Smith was also bludgeoned. Two of Grant’s lawyers argued he was mentally ill and brain-damaged after being beaten as a child. However, members of the victims’ families pleaded with the Pardon and Parole Board to reject the clemency request. The board voted against the request in a 4-1 ruling.
Over 7,000 people signed a petition to halt Grant’s execution, stating the jury had not been aware of how extensive his brain damage was or its impact on his crime.
Grant also petitioned the Supreme Court to postpone his execution so he could challenge Oklahoma’s three-drug lethal injection policy as unconstitutional due to the risk of a botched execution causing pain and suffering. However, the Supreme Court denied the request Wednesday. A federal judge and a panel on Oklahoma’s 10th Circuit Court of Appeals also denied his request.
Several death-row inmates in Oklahoma also petitioned to join the lawsuit after John Grant vomited when the first drug was administered in his execution in October. John Grant was the first person executed after a mandatory six-year hiatus in the state after a series of problems occurred with the state’s lethal injection protocols in 2014 and 2015. John Grant, who killed a prison cafeteria worker named Gay Carson by stabbing her 16 times in a mop closet, was placed on death row in 1999.
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Donald Grant’s execution was the state’s third execution since returning from the hiatus. Another execution in the state is scheduled for Feb. 17. The inmate, Gilbert Postelle, also petitioned for a stay in his execution to join the lawsuit, which will be heard on Feb. 28.
