LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Two condemned Arkansas killers who admit they're guilty but fear their poor health could lead to extreme pain during lethal injections set for Monday might become the first inmates put to death in a double execution in the U.S. in more than 16 years.
Jack Jones and Marcel Williams are set to die in what would be the second and third Arkansas inmates executed this month as part of the state's aggressive plan to execute several inmates before one of its lethal injection drugs expires.
The state executed Ledell Lee last week in the state's first use of capital punishment since 2005. Gov. Asa Hutchinson originally scheduled four double executions over an 11-day period in April. The eight executions would have been the most by a state in such a compressed period since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976. The state said the executions needed to be carried out before its supply of the sedative midazolam expires on April 30.
The last time that a state put more than one inmate to death on the same day was when Texas executed two condemned killers in August of 2000.
Williams was sent to death row for the 1994 rape and killing of 22-year-old Stacy Errickson. He had kidnapped her from a gas station in central Arkansas.
Authorities said Williams abducted and raped two other women in the days before he was arrested in Errickson's death. Williams told the state Parole Board last month he took responsibility for his crime.
"I wish I could take it back, but I can't," Williams told the board.
Jones was given the death penalty for the 1995 rape and killing of Mary Phillips. He strangled her with the cord to a coffee pot.
In a letter earlier this month, Jones said he was ready to be killed by the state.
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