Oklahoma commission recommends moratorium on death penalty as Arkansas plans next execution

One day after Arkansas’ Cummins Unit prison facility was the site of the nation’s first double execution in 17 years, a commission in Oklahoma is recommending a moratorium on the death penalty, citing “the volume and seriousness of the flaws” in the state’s capital punishment system.

The Oklahoma report was released Tuesday (April 25) as Arkansas garners international attention for its aggressive 11-day timetable of scheduled executions that began on April 17 and ends Thursday.  In comparison to Oklahoma’s recent death penalty woes, Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s chief spokesman, J.R. Davis, reiterated his comments from Monday night that Arkansas Department of Correction’s (ADC) performance in carrying out the recent executions of death-row inmates Ledell Lee, Jack Jones and Marcel Williams was “flawless.”

“I used the word ‘flawless’ in my remarks last night because it accurately reflects the way each execution was carried out,” Davis told Talk Business & Politics.

Davis also said the governor has the utmost confidence in ADC Director Wendy Kelley and the ADC staff to carry out Thursday’s execution of inmate Kenneth Williams, whose crimes have been called the most heinous of all the state’s death-row prisoners. In reference to the Oklahoma Commission’s moratorium on that state’s death penalty, Davis said he can only speak for Arkansas.

“There is no question as to the ability of … (ADC) to responsibly and carefully carry out the responsibility they’ve been tasked with under Arkansas law, and they’ve proven exactly that over the last week.”

‘TROUBLING FAILURES’ IN OKLAHOMA
By contrast, the 294-page report released by the Oklahoma Death Penalty Review Commission recommends that Arkansas’ neighboring state extend its current moratorium on the death penalty and halt all executions until significant reforms are accomplished.

“In light of the extensive information gathered from this year-long, in-depth study, the Commission members unanimously recommend that the current moratorium on the death penalty be extended,” said former Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry, co-chair of the task force. “The Commission did not come to this decision lightly. While some … members had disagreements with some of the recommendations contained in this report, there was consensus on each of the recommendations.”

The 11-member Oklahoma Commission came together nearly two years ago after the executions were put on hold while a grand jury investigated disturbing problems involving recent executions, including departures from the execution protocols by the Oklahoma Department of Corrections. The report of the grand jury, released in May 2016, was highly critical and exposed a number of troubling failures in the final stages of Oklahoma’s death penalty. The Commission has spent more than a year studying aspects of the Oklahoma death penalty system, from arrest to execution, and even examined the costs of the system to taxpayers.

The commission members included five women and six men. They included Republicans and Democrats, prosecutors, and defense attorneys, individuals who have served in each of the three branches of government, law school professors and law school deans, victims’ advocates, and advocates for Native Americans. The Commission met 10 times for full-day meetings and heard from a variety of experts.

In the executive summary of today’s report, the Oklahoma task force said it was grateful to hear from those with direct knowledge of how the system operates — including law enforcement, prosecutors, defense attorneys, judges, families of murdered victims, and the families of those wrongfully convicted.

NOT ALWAYS ‘CARRIED OUT FAIRLY’
According to the Commission, many of the findings from the group’s year-long investigation were disturbing and led members to question whether the death penalty can be administered in a way in Oklahoma that ensures no innocent person is put to death. Commission members agreed that, at a minimum, those who are sentenced to death should receive this sentence only after a fair and impartial process that ensures they deserve the ultimate penalty of death.

“To be sure, the United States Supreme Court has emphasized that the death penalty should be applied only to ‘the worst of the worst,’” the report said. “Unfortunately, a review of the evidence demonstrates that the death penalty, even in Oklahoma, has not always been imposed and carried out fairly, consistently, and humanely, as required by the federal and state constitutions.”

The Commission’s report also concluded that shortcomings in Oklahoma’s execution system has had severe consequences for the accused and their families, for victims and their families, and for all citizens of Oklahoma. It also noted many Oklahomans support the availability of the death penalty, as evidenced by the vote in favor of State Question 776 in the November 2016 election.

State Question 776, which was approved by 66.3% of Oklahoma’s voters last year, gave the state legislature the authority to provide any method of administering the death penalty not prohibited by the U.S. Constitution.

“Nevertheless, it is undeniable that innocent people have been sentenced to death in Oklahoma. And the burden of wrongful convictions alone requires the systemic corrections recommended in this report,” the report said.

Altogether, the death penalty task force makes nearly 50 recommendations in its findings, including the use of a one drug-protocol over the current controversial three-drug cocktail that Oklahoma, Arkansas and other states now use. The report also recommends additional resources and training for Oklahoma correction officials and all those involved in the execution processes and changes to the appeals process.

ARKANSAS SIMILARITIES
Some concerns about Oklahoma execution protocols have been raised in Arkansas. For example, many of the court filings seeking to halt Gov. Hutchinson’s ongoing execution schedule have brought up the botched Oklahoma execution of Clayton Lockett in April 2014, which led to the state’s current reforms.

During federal court hearings in Little Rock nearly three weeks ago on the Arkansas executions, former Tulsa World report Ziva Branstetter gave graphic details of the lethal injection of Lockett while she was a Tulsa World reporter. Midazolam, the same sedative used in the first step of Arkansas’ three-drug mix, was used in executing Lockett, who was on death row for the murder, rape and kidnapping of 19-year old Stephanie Neiman in 1999.

And while the Oklahoma task force recommends officials in that state switch to a one-drug protocol before it restarts capital punishment, Arkansas may also have to look at other alternatives. The state’s supply of midazolam expires April 30. Resupplying execution drugs has proven a challenge because drug manufacturers do not wish to be associated with the death penalty for moral or public relations reasons.

At Monday night’s execution of Arkansas inmates Jack Jones and Marcel Williams, the first double execution in the U.S. since 2000, reporters at the Cummins prison in Grady bombarded ADC spokesman Solomon Graves with questions about the injection of midazolam into Jones’ arm during preparation for lethal injection. In the three-drug process, midazolam is used to render the prisoner unconscious first, while the second drug paralyzes and the third stops the heart.

According to Graves and media witnesses at Jones’ execution, it took the ADC medical staff 45 minutes to place an IV into the obese inmate’s right arm after failing to find a central line to his neck. But the execution moved forward  and Jones died at 7:20 p.m. Williams was later given a temporary stay after his attorneys cited the long delay to insert the lethal injection drugs into Jones. However, that stay was lifted at 9:21 p.m. and Williams was pronounced dead by prison officials at 10:33 p.m.

On Thursday, the execution of Kenneth Williams is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. He is the last of eight death-row inmates originally set to be executed by Gov. Hutchinson. However, in separate legal actions, stays of executions were granted for inmates Don Davis, Bruce Ward, and Stacey Johnson. Jason McGehee, who was scheduled to die with Williams, was recommended for clemency in early April.

Hutchinson has denied clemency to Kenneth Williams, who was convicted for the October 1999 murder of Cecil Boren. At the time, Williams was already serving a life sentence without parole for the kidnapping and killing of University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff cheerleader Dominique Hurd when he escaped from prison, murdered Boren, and stole his truck.

While driving that truck, he was involved in an accident in Missouri that killed Michael Greenwood of Springfield, Mo. He later confessed in a newspaper letter to the editor of killing Jerrell Jenkins of Pine Bluff, the Associated Press reported in 2005.

After Williams’ execution on Thursday, Davis has said Hutchinson plans to sit down with his staff and ADC officials to determine how to move forward with the state’s execution protocol after the state’s supply of midazolam expires. The governor also plans to review the delayed executions of Davis, Ward and Johnson, who all received temporary stays from the courts.

Prior to the round of April executions, there were 34 inmates on Arkansas’ death row.