A Missouri inmate has been executed after the US supreme court turned down a last-minute appeal.
Andre Cole, convicted of stabbing a man to death and severely injuring a woman in 1998, was put to death Tuesday night at the state prison in Bonne Terre. He became the third convicted killer executed in Missouri this year.
Attorneys for Cole, 52, had appealed to the nation’s highest court after a federal appeals court earlier on Tuesday ruled that the execution could go forward, finding that the man was given his legal due process to argue about his mental health.
Cole’s attorneys argued that their client was mentally unfit to be executed and should be allowed a competency hearing.
“He hears voices over the TV, over the prison intercom, everywhere,” Cole’s attorney Joseph Luby told the Associated Press. He said Cole believed that Missouri governor Jay Nixon, prosecutors and others “are giving him messages about his case”.
Cole was convicted in the killing of a man over child support payments in St. Louis County. The execution had been scheduled for 6pm Tuesday but was delayed by the appeals.
After appeals were exhausted, Cole was executed by lethal injection at 10.15pm CT and pronounced dead at 10.24pm.
Nixon declined to stop the execution, saying in a statement on Tuesday night that he had denied Cole’s request for clemency. “There is no doubt of Andre Cole’s guilt in the murder of Anthony Curtis, who he stabbed more than 20 times,” the statement said. “Cole also attacked his ex-wife, Terri, at the same time, but she survived.
“This was a brutal crime, and my denial of clemency upholds the court’s decision to impose a sentence of death.”
Attorney general Chris Koster said in a statement he hoped “that the sentence carried out tonight brings those forever impacted by this tragedy a sense of justice and a measure of closure”.
A three-judge panel of the 8th US circuit court of appeals earlier Tuesday ruled 2-1 in favor of Missouri officials in Cole’s case. That came after US district judge Catherine Perry put the execution on hold, saying Cole should not be put to death.
The Missouri attorney general’s office quickly appealed Perry’s ruling to the 8th circuit, arguing there was no legal reason for the judge to overturn a Missouri supreme court ruling that allowed the execution to proceed.
In overturning Perry’s ruling, the appeals court found that Cole and his lawyers had been given ample opportunity to argue that he was not mentally fit to be executed, but failed to convince the state supreme court.
Defense attorneys immediately appealed to the US supreme court.
Cole’s attorneys earlier had asked the high court to stop the execution based in part on concerns over Missouri’s execution drug, which was purchased from a compounding pharmacy that the state refuses to identify.
Several outside groups, including the NAACP and the American Civil Liberties Union, urged Nixon to stop the execution and appoint a board to examine concerns that there was racial bias in Missouri’s jury selection process. Cole, who is black, was convicted and sentenced by an all-white jury.
“The criminal justice system in this country is unfair,” said Jeffrey Mittman, executive director of the ACLU in St Louis. “It targets persons of color. It treats the African-American community differently.”
Cole’s brother said the crime was out of character and did not merit the death penalty. “It was a one-time thing,” said DeAngelo Cole, 38, of Las Vegas. “He didn’t have a history of that kind of behavior.”
Andre Cole and his wife, Terri, divorced in 1995. The couple had two children and fought about visitation. Evidence showed that Andre Cole was upset that the government had ordered $3,000 in unpaid child support to be taken from his wages over the course of several paychecks.
The first deduction appeared on his paycheck dated 21 August 1998. Hours later, Cole forced his way into his ex-wife’s home and was confronted by Anthony Curtis, who was visiting. Andre Cole stabbed Curtis and Terri Cole repeatedly. Curtis died, while Terri Cole survived.
Andre Cole fled the state but surrendered 33 days later. He claimed at trial that he did not bring a weapon into Terri Cole’s house and that Curtis initiated the attack with a knife.
St Louis County prosecutors removed three black potential jurors from the pool of candidates, according to Cole’s supporters. Mittman said one black man was removed because he was divorced, but a white juror was not removed even though he was paying child support.
Missouri tied Texas for the most executions in 2014 with 10. Missouri has now executed 15 men since November 2013.
