Execution dates set for 2 Alabama inmates

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Execution dates set for 2 Alabama inmates

Kim Chandler, Associated Press

Updated 5:55 pm, Thursday, September 15, 2016

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The Alabama Supreme Court has set execution dates for two state inmates, including one who unsuccessfully challenged the state's lethal injection process as cruel and unusual punishment.

Tommy Arthur is scheduled to be executed on Nov. 3 and Ronald Bert Smith Jr. on Dec. 8. The court determined both dates late Wednesday.

Arthur was convicted of the 1982 murder-for-hire of Muscle Shoals businessman Troy Wicker. He has been given an execution date on six previous occasions, but has challenged the state's execution methods as unconstitutional. The Alabama attorney general's office in July had asked the court to set an "expedited seventh execution date" after a federal judge dismissed Arthur's most recent challenge. Arthur is appealing, according to federal court records.

Smith was convicted in the 1994 robbery and slaying of Huntsville convenience store clerk Casey Wilson. A jury, in a 7-5 vote, recommended a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole, according to court records. The trial judge, however, sentenced Smith to death.

Read more: http://www.chron.com/news/crime/article/Execution-dates-set-for-2-Alabama-inmates-9224902.php

[Uponthegears]

1. Sad

In Arthur's case, the woman who supposedly (DNA testing failed to match Arthur to a wig worn by the killer) had the money to hire him to do her dirty work for her didn't get the death penalty and Smith's death sentence would be unconstitutional today under Hurst v. Florida but the Supreme Court hasn't decided if Hurst is to be applied retroactively to old cases like his.

Of course none of that matters in one of the most bloodthirsty nations on Earth.

[christx30]

2. I'd say that Saudi Arabia would qualify as the most

bloodthirsty nation on Earth, considering they still behead people with a sword. And they jail/flog people for the crime of drinking. Or maybe Philippians, with their president giving the green light to gun drug dealers and users down in the street.
Arthur was convicted in a crime that happened 34 years ago. He killed a guy because someone paid him money.
The state doesn't seem to be the bloodthirsty one to me.
Smith wanted to steal the contents of a cash register 22 years go, which is why he killed the clerk. Again, he's the blood thirsty one, not the state. I'm sure the clerk, Casey Wilson, wishes he could have appealed the death sentence Smith gave him.
If you don't go out and rob stores, you don't have to worry about killing someone and being sentenced to death. Should be super easy stuff. Find some other way of spending a Tuesday night.

[Uponthegears]

3. Yea, ain't Alabama great

If you have the money to hire some mentally impaired guy to do your killing for you, Alabama will clean up your mess and put you back on the street. ARTHUR

OR

If 7 citizens say you should get a life sentence, Alabama will let some right wing elected judge kill you anyway. SMITH

But, what the heck, we're more civilized than Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, so what if we're less civilized than every other Western Democracy?

But the taste of blood is so addictive isn't it?