A 50-year-old man from Alabama state in US who was convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend decades ago was executed despite opposition from the victim’s family to spare him.
According to reports, Joe Nathan James Jr. received a lethal injection at a south Alabama prison. He was pronounced dead at 9. 27 pm on Thursday after the execution was delayed by nearly three hours.
The official proceedings began with the incarceration after the US Supreme Court denied his request for a stay.
The 50-year-old convict was sentenced to death in 1994 for shooting dead Faith Hall, 26, in Birmingham.
Alabama Governor Kay Ivey on Wednesday said that the execution would proceed as per the plans even though Hall’s daughters said that they were fine with having James serve life in prison instead of capital punishment.
“Today is a tragic day for our family. We are having to relive the hurt that this caused us many years ago,” Hall’s family said in a statement published by the local TV station WIAT.
“We hoped the state wouldn’t take a life simply because a life was taken, and we have forgiven Mr Joe Nathan James Jr … We pray that God allows us to find healing after today and that one day our criminal justice system will listen to the cries of families like ours even if it goes against what the state wishes. Our voices matter and so does the life of Mr Joe Nathan James Jr.”
According to the prosecutors James had become obsessed with Hall after she rejected him. He continued to stalk and harass her for months before killing her.
The killing took place on August 15, 1994, when James forced his way in Hall’s friend’s apartment, pulled a gun from his waistband and shot she three times, according to court documents.
James was then convicted of capital murder in 1996 by Jefferson county, which voted to recommend the death penalty, which a judge imposed.
The ruling was later overturned when a state appeals court ruled that the judge had wrongly admitted some police reports into evidence. James was retried and again sentenced to death in 1999, when jurors trashed defence claims that he was under emotional duress at the time of the killing.
(With inputs from agencies)
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