Freddie Owens, a South Carolina death row inmate convicted in the 1997 killing of a convenience store clerk during a robbery, was executed on Friday after a 13-year pause in executions due to a lack of lethal injection drugs. Despite last-minute appeals, including a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, Owens’ sentence was not commuted by Governor Henry McMaster. He chose not to make a final statement and was pronounced dead after the administered drugs took effect.
Owens’ case was complicated by the fact that he also killed another person while awaiting sentencing in the convenience store clerk’s murder. Confessions to both crimes were read to various juries and judges who ultimately sentenced him to death. Owens had his sentence overturned twice but ended up back on death row.
His legal team argued that scientific evidence did not conclusively prove he was the shooter in the convenience store murder and cited a turbulent childhood marked by violence. The execution was met with protests and a vigil by anti-death penalty activists outside the prison.
This execution represents the first in a series that South Carolina plans to carry out every five weeks after legal battles and legislative changes, including adding the firing squad as an alternative method. Despite state efforts to restart executions, the death row population in South Carolina has significantly decreased in recent years due to successful appeals and natural causes.
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