South Carolina is set to carry out its third execution since September as the state continues addressing a backlog of inmates who had exhausted their appeals while officials struggled to procure lethal injection drugs, reports AP.
Marion Bowman Jr.’s execution is planned for 6 p.m. on Friday at a prison in Columbia. The 44-year-old was found guilty of murder for the shooting death of a friend, whose charred remains were discovered in a car trunk.
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Since his arrest, Bowman has insisted on his innocence. His attorneys argue that his conviction relied on testimony from multiple friends and relatives who received plea deals or had charges dismissed in exchange for their cooperation.
Bowman, who has spent more than half his life on death row, had the option of a plea deal that would have resulted in a life sentence. However, he chose to stand trial, maintaining that he was not guilty.
Friday’s execution follows the state’s decision to lift a 13-year halt, partly due to officials’ inability to acquire lethal injection drugs. After the General Assembly enacted a shield law, prison authorities secured a compounding pharmacy willing to produce pentobarbital under the condition that its identity remained confidential.
Bowman is not seeking clemency from Governor Henry McMaster. His attorney, Lindsey Vann, stated that Bowman did not want to spend further decades imprisoned for a crime he maintains he did not commit.
“After over twenty years of struggling against a flawed system that has failed him at every step, Marion’s choice is a strong rejection of an unfair process that has already taken so much of his life,” Vann said in a statement on Thursday.
No South Carolina governor has ever granted clemency to reduce a death sentence to life without parole in the 45 executions carried out since capital punishment resumed in 1976.
Bowman was convicted in 2002 in Dorchester County for the 2001 murder of 21-year-old Kandee Martin. Several friends and relatives testified against him as part of plea bargains.
One witness claimed Bowman was angry because Martin owed him money, while another said he suspected she was wearing a recording device to have him arrested.
Bowman admitted to selling drugs to Martin, whom he had known for years, and said she sometimes paid with sex. However, he denied killing her.
Bowman, like the two previously executed inmates since the moratorium ended, is Black. His lawyers argued in a final appeal that his trial attorney showed excessive sympathy toward his white victim, but the South Carolina Supreme Court dismissed the claim as baseless.
Another issue raised by Bowman’s legal team concerns his weight. An anaesthesiologist expressed concern that South Carolina’s undisclosed lethal injection procedures might not account for Bowman’s listed weight of 389 pounds (176 kilograms) in prison records. In cases of obesity, establishing an IV line correctly and determining the necessary drug dosage can be challenging.
According to autopsy reports, prison officials administered two doses of pentobarbital, spaced 11 minutes apart, during the last execution.
Before the 13-year suspension, South Carolina was among the most active states in carrying out executions. The shield law passed last year allowed the state to keep its pentobarbital supplier confidential, enabling prison authorities to acquire the drug.
The state Supreme Court approved the resumption of executions in July. Freddie Owens was put to death via lethal injection on September 20, followed by Richard Moore on November 1.
Executions will now occur every five weeks until the remaining three inmates who have exhausted their appeals are executed.
Since capital punishment was reinstated in the U.S. in 1976, South Carolina has executed 45 individuals. In the early 2000s, the state averaged three executions per year. Nine other states have carried out more executions.
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However, South Carolina’s death row population has significantly declined since the unintended pause. In early 2011, the state housed 63 condemned inmates. That number has since dropped to 30, with around 20 prisoners receiving different sentences following successful appeals, while others have died of natural causes.