HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — A person convicted of killing 3 youngsters whilst they slept in a Texas Panhandle house greater than 25 years in the past used to be performed on Wednesday, the 6th inmate to be put to dying within the U.S. this 12 months and the second one in as many days.
John Balentine, 54, whose legal professionals had argued that his trial used to be marred by way of racial bias, gained a deadly injection on the state reformatory in Huntsville, Texas, for the January 1998 taking pictures deaths of Edward Mark Caylor, 17, Kai Brooke Geyer, 15, and Steven Watson, 15, at a house in Amarillo. Prosecutors stated all 3 had been shot as soon as within the head as they slept.
Balentine seemed jovial as witnesses had been coming into the dying chamber, asking if any individual status close to the gurney may take away the sheet overlaying the decrease two-thirds of his frame “and therapeutic massage my toes.” Then he chuckled.
After a temporary prayer from a religious adviser who held Balentine’s left foot together with his proper hand, the prisoner gave a brief commentary thanking pals for supporting him. Then he became his head to appear thru a window at seven kinfolk of his 3 homicide sufferers and apologized.
“I’m hoping you’ll in finding on your middle to forgive me,” he stated.
The moms of each and every of the 3 sufferers had been a number of the witnesses a couple of toes from him.
He took two breaths because the deadly dose of the robust sedative pentobarbital started flowing thru intravenous needles in his hands, snored two times, yawned and started noisily snoring once more loudly. The snores — 11 of them —become gradually quieter, then stopped.
At 6:36 p.m., quarter-hour after the medicine started, a doctor pronounced him useless. The sufferers’ witnesses then shared high-fives prior to leaving the dying chamber. They declined to talk with journalists in a while.
Caylor’s sister, who used to be a number of the witnesses looking at him die, used to be Balentine’s former female friend, and prosecutors stated the shootings stemmed from a feud between Caylor and Balentine. Ballentine, then again, argued that Caylor and others had threatened his existence over his interracial dating. Balentine is Black. The 3 sufferers had been white.
Balentine confessed to the murders. Certainly one of his trial legal professionals stated Balentine became down a plea settlement that will have sentenced him to existence in jail for the reason that racists threats he gained made him fearful of being attacked or killed whilst incarcerated.
Legal professionals had been pursuing two criminal methods to save lots of their shopper prior to he used to be performed. The primary used to be to argue that his trial and sentencing had been tainted by way of racism. However Balentine used to be additionally amongst 5 Texas dying row inmates who sued to forestall the state’s jail machine from the use of what they allege are expired and hazardous execution medication. Regardless of a civil courtroom pass judgement on in Austin preliminarily agreeing with the claims, the state’s most sensible two courts have now allowed 3 of the 5 inmates collaborating within the lawsuit to be performed. Robert Fratta, 65, used to be put to dying Jan. 10 and Wesley Ruiz, 43, on Feb. 1.
Jail officers stated the state’s provide of execution medication is protected.
One at a time, Balentine’s legal professionals alleged the jury foreman in his case, Dory England, held racist perspectives and used racial slurs all over his existence and bullied different jurors who had sought after to condemn Balentine to a existence sentence into converting their minds. Lola Perkins, who were married to England’s brother, informed Balentine’s legal professionals that England “used to be racist towards Black folks as a result of this is how he used to be raised.”
England, in a declaration prior to his dying in 2021, stated he driven for Balentine’s dying sentence as a result of he frightened if the accused used to be ever launched that England himself “would want to hunt him down.” On the other hand, England additionally stated he threatened to record every other juror to the pass judgement on for making prejudiced feedback when the individual “began going off about this Black man killing those white youngsters.”
Balentine’s legal professionals additionally alleged prosecutors averted all potential Black jurors from serving on the trial and that Balentine’s trial attorneys referred to the sentencing complaints in a be aware as a “justifiable lynching.”
Randall Sherrod, certainly one of Balentine’s trial legal professionals, stated Wednesday he may now not keep in mind the be aware however denied that he or the opposite legal professional, James Durham Jr., had any racist attitudes towards Balentine. Durham died in 2006.
“I feel he were given an excellent trial,” Sherrod stated of Balentine. “I feel we had a just right jury. … We attempted to lend a hand John no matter manner shall we.”
The U.S. Superb Court docket on Wednesday declined an enchantment from Balentine’s legal professionals to halt the execution in order that his claims of racial bias may well be correctly reviewed.
A protection request for Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to briefly keep the execution additionally failed and the Texas Court docket of Legal Appeals denied a request to stick Ballentine’s execution over allegations that “racism and racial problems pervaded” his trial. The appeals courtroom denied the keep on procedural grounds with out reviewing the deserves.
On Wednesday afternoon, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles unanimously declined to trip Balentine’s dying sentence to a lesser punishment or to grant a 30-day reprieve.
“With no thorough judicial attention of Mr. Balentine’s claims, we will don’t have any self assurance that the dying verdict isn’t tainted by way of racial bias,” stated Shawn Nolan, certainly one of Balentine’s legal professionals.
Potter County District Legal professional Randall Sims, whose jurisdiction comprises Amarillo, the place the murders passed off, had driven for the execution to move ahead. On Monday he declined to remark forward of the execution.
Koda Shadix, the more youthful brother of Geyer, one of the crucial sufferers, stated in a video posted on-line final week that he used to be disappointed by way of efforts to extend justice.
Balentine has “proven no regret and completely does now not care what he did. All he cares about is his existence,” Shadix stated.
Lozano reported from Houston.
Apply Juan A. Lozano on Twitter at https://twitter.com/juanlozano70.
